The floor is the door.
Make bedrock your base camp.
Rest easy
‘Til ready
To Assault.
No, not to eclipse a Summit
Today;
Nor to languish in the fell crevasse
Forever.
But, Ah!
How
Peak aims
And a dare--
To climb without air--
Caused a fall
Not belayed
So Fortune’s waylaid
At Rock Bottom.
So, so low
Far, far gone
Knees now knock with The Bends
‘Is this how it ends?’
A watch could show you it’s daybreak
If you could only see it.
The mountain shouldered dawn aside
Leaving only gray shades before you.
No one is coming.
Self-Arrest
Self-Extricate
Probe and claw with that ice axe
Down and Out.
Make safe passage
Through subterranean locks
Crunch crampons outward to elsewhere
And anywhere but Up.
Dripping Stalactites?
Not Everything is all-frozen. . .
Progress!
It’s there—
Where small things
Begin to be savored more.
But you can’t make it
Until you find
The door in the floor
At Rock Bottom.
