Nature 1902[8] an earthy matrix the work and the tunnel will take many years to complete our backs growing stiff as we crawl over soft husks of animals who never reached the sea patience does not protect us from darkness we absorb the resonating arcs of black light until its signal threatens to overwhelm the sound of our blood * a path begins to shape itself bulging forward each moment flickering under our feet venomous over our heads a great tongue-shaped mass without rain the loss of life is a small loop ascending from this valley [9] lakes covered with cinder trees covered with a metallic black coat the last soft sounds of mammals teeth and milk no plants protected even in deep ravines just dark dense stone warm to the touch * chemical fog eats our hair even as rains run boiling we trace these lines our electrified bodies swell light comes from the best parts touching we cannot utter a single word to describe the air but beneath our ribs our lungs keep breathing [10] our arms and spines move with the mountain's weight forced back toward the desire that birthed us tangled woods wild moors deep lakes rising in open air we remember them best before nervous energy turns to words * ash moves down our throats this world was fertile once it will be again the grass the flowers open and spilling dead tissue is an essential instruction we can use to read the field not just matter changing form this is a ritual a repair Garth Graeper is an editor at Ugly Duckling Presse in Brooklyn, NY, and the author of two chapbooks, Into the Forest Engine (Projective Industries) and By Deer Light (Greying Ghost). He is often thinking about Dorothy Wordsworth and/or volcanoes at blackmountainmass.tumblr.com. |