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Lone Mountain
By Ed Bennett

Pushed up and through
the desert hardpan,
not high, but alone –
some geologic legerdemain
with a volcanic punch line.

The Old Ones prayed here,
the shadows and petroglyphs
turn sandstone and shist
into their cathedral:
Chartres of the Wind and Dust.

Nothing has broken the
staunch rock spine
with earthmovers or
trenching equipment to
bury pipes and wire

to precede the devastation
of inside plumbing and
the infantile striations
of dirt bike Rambos
on weekend afternoons.

Perhaps the Old Ones
stopped the madness
with the echoes of prayer
the touch of ancient fingers
sounding out the spirit drum.

Pushed up and through
the desert hardpan
the ghosts of Old Ones
chant the mountain story
across the river of days.






 


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