Snoquera

Softly, the flake descend in the open meadow,
The extended green boughs of great cedars turn to white,
As with the passage of the ghosts of the for deposit their essence.
I walk silently through the winter forest,
Everywhere the sound of water in its passing,
Yet still the silence is broken by the muffle of the flake.
I am caught in a dream it seems,
Yet the vitality of nature reminds me that it is all real
And passing the time before me.

A call to my spirit pushes me down the trail,
every so often slowing my pace to stop beside a brook
or a downed log.
I ascend slowly towards the ridge cliffs,
The echos of a waterfall calling deep to my heart.
A lone passenger of this way,
The forest for a moment seems alone,
Only halls of silent mist between the trees.
A deer reminds me better,
First glancing slowly towards my direction.
It seems I can hear his pulse quicken with mine as well,
For now the forest seems to come alive before me.
he bounds off…

It has indeed been far too long since I seen his spirit,
And like wise far to long since I have seen my own,
Between these woods.
A trail junction, a sign with an arrow,
All leading higher still towards the palisades.
Ancient Snoquera like a veil streaming down towards the floor.
I push further even more.

The trail is among the hemlock and the cedar,
The salal forms the ground,
Each a different shade of green.
The moss hangs from the trees electric with life,
Telling of the forests long damp age.
All are dusted with a coat of white,
Again the switchback takes me higher still.

I push around the corner to see waterfalling from the top palisafde,
The mist hiding the twists and turns of the rock wall.
Edge with white against the deep purple rock,
The thunder of the falls seems to remind me of the bellows.
The climber in me looks up the short cracks,
Snaking their way, block by block to the summit,
My heart seems to follow my eyes upward into the blue above the ledge.
My chest reverberates like a drum following pulse of the cataracts flow.

After a bit, I try and follow the trails loop beneath the crags edge.
Soon I am pushed out onto the loose talus,
Lost the trail long ago.
I told myself adventure is what I seek,
And so I begin to descend the slides towards the camp below,
Loose rocks covered with moss and old slides
Beginning to flow below my feet.
But this is the place I have been before,
High on the mountain, darkness approaches
And the cold wind beginning to blow.

With an old confidence, I place each step,
Lasting not to long to begin to go,
Yet keeping pace with the fading light.
A thousand feet seem to click off quickly,
And yet there still there is another to go.
My approach is found,
Down into the forest’s edge,
I find the deers evidence, following drop to drop
I am not alone.

A rock here, a log there,
A jump to a bed of hemlock and cedar needles,
It seems almost fluid, like the cascading streams
Descending ever below.
Soon it levels off and I turn my bearing,
A warm cabin and hot coffee,
Seems to make me glow…
Again the woods seeps in,
And I know I am home…