25. Epiphany

They scramble up another hill
of glacial granite scrabble,
their knees so scarred that
even when they fall
there's no blood. From my in
visible aerie a thousand meters
up, I know it's their last climb.
They don't until they reach
the top. They stop. The setting
sun glints hard off the cold
mirror of the distant ocean.
The deep gray mountains have
long since erased their memory
of green, and I share their joy
in the sight of silver light
flowing pure and generous into
their eyes. It's enough because
it's all. They sit and, breathing
hard, they look and look and look.
Sleek, hard clouds promise snow
this night. The long smooth slope
to the long-sought sea offers no
hint of shelter. They get up and
make the easy trek to the shore.
Up here even I hear and feel the
brittle crunch and crack of old,
old slate, breaking at last un
der their cold and calloused feet.
I want so much for them to speak
before the curtain falls, but
it's their moment, their script,
their pain, their paradox to
decorate or leave plain
and brutal. Their hard stepping
raises a smudge of gulls who
screeching rise and veer sea
ward. The sun is suddenly gone.
One blast of light caroms toward
them and me then fades to dark
gray, and still I hear their steps.
Finally they stop. They're there.
I wait, blinded by the new night.
I hear one inhale. He or she--
I can't tell which--inserts
a three-beat pause (not bad),
and over our once-green fields
where all of us played ten thou
sand years ago comes curtain
line: "What now, motherfuckers?"

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