Holding and Containing
I was afraid of hills
because I couldn’t see.
When you’re afraid to be held,
a hill’s abhorrent;
the way it tries to undulate
in front of you, to fold you in,
to stand in the path
of your running. A hill
is the will of the world
pressing in on you,
covering you with its shadow,
fixing you with its weight.
It takes the late evening sun
down before its time,
and hides the morning’s herald.
A hill is an immoveable
judgment on your insignificance,
on your entirely unnecessary
presence. A hill introduces
separateness between the earth and sky;
it is the eye of the world
looking down on you.
or
A hill is the rising up of a
different story, something
new amidst the distance
of aloneness, and the space
between a someone else and me.
A hill softly lets the light
topple over its surface,
breaking up the contours of the view.
It is a metamorphosis of sight;
a lesson in uncertainty,
in the hard climb of the
openness to love, and the permeability
of the ground beneath.
A hill is being held
at the breast of the world;
a hill is a relief.