MOUNTAIN-SCAPES

by Hugh M. Lewis

The spirit of the valley never dies.

This is called the mysterious female.

The gateway of the mysterious female

Is called the root of heaven and earth.

Dimly visible, it seems as if it were there,

Yet use will never drain it.

Challenges confront us from almost every direction. Everyday we face unforeseen challenges which become our existential dilemma to deal with and somehow overcome. But overcoming our life's challenges serves to strengthen us and give us courage and skill in meeting new challenges. Facing and resolving such challenges is a natural state of our existence. It is an expression and honing of our instincts for survival in life, and as such also constitute a vital expression of our own earth being.

A large part of the neurotic condition of modern life is due to the escape from challenges which is promised us in the illusion of convenience and technological solutions to our problems, to the inflation of our needs, the contrived substitution of "canned challenges" with known outcomes, and so on. The thing about genuine challenges are that they have unknown outcomes and unexpected consequences. We cannot know ahead of time what effects our reactions will ultimately have. Thus we are forced to act within an existential dilemma of basic uncertainty and doubt that it becomes our predicament to learn to deal with and control in an effective and successful manner.

Even when challenges are removed, it is found that human's have an "instinct" for challenge which drives them to seek it out in their worlds anyway. They climb mountains, swim in deep oceans, drive fast cars, jump out of airplanes. We have evolved into what we are now as a consequence of meeting and adapting to such challenges in life.

It is by means of overcoming these challenges that we infuse our lives with greater depth and breadth of meaning--of meaning that is more in tune to our own and others' earth being.

We climb mountains and though the uphill going is difficult and sometimes risky. We are rewarded with breathtaking vistas when we reach the summit.

silent stairway

long and steep and lonely

leading up and up and up

forever upward

each step up

a step in greater solitude

either side a deep chasm

threatening to fall into nothingness

into a bottomless abyss

our ascent up into the heavens

leads us further and further

away from the ways of the world

it never ends

and becomes increasingly difficult

fearing to look back down

no one talks

and no one reveals their names

or their true identities

no one is overly friendly

as everyone rushes like a mad crowd

up along the steps

as fast as they can go

as hard and long as their legs can carry them

without waiting for each other

without wanting to be bothered

cannot stop or slow down

without becoming left behind

and soon forgotten

trampled beneath the many feet

along with the names

what was important before

is now all so trivial

leaving me to wonder if what is so important now

might not soon become trivial as well

the old arguments have been replaced

by new ones

I reached some point

a few semesters back

when I began writing too much

to independently, too clearly

it was at that point

that I learned too much

I suddenly found myself

no longer in conformity

not for what I didn't know

but for knowing too much

leaving me to doubt

whether however I play the game

I will always be guaranteed to lose

In our grand game of living

sitting silently in the corridors

between all the classrooms

so many young faces

coming and going

I've suddenly grown too old

and I'm still sitting as I was ten years ago

along the edge of the halls of higher learning

nothing that happened inbetween having much mattered

the only real difference now being

that I'm ten years older and no wiser

sitting cross-legged like some anonymous Buddha

my back is chronically sore

and my body is not as slim as before

I'm a bit more burned out

Now I'm waiting to become reconditioned

just like I was back in the beginning

caught in wheels within wheels

within the grand gears of being

something's supposed to be wrong

with reinventing the wheel

It's all been done before, you see

we want something new and different

than just the same old wheel

it doesn't matter how it's been done

doing it all over again can't help at all

so it all goes without saying , you see

that its boring and uninteresting

all this stuff about wheels and things

nothing new is to be gained

by drawing a perfect circle

or standing still at the hub of a turning wheel

like a mousetrap or a can opener

a better wheel can't be done

you see

Sometimes we get lost along the way

losing our way that becomes difficult to find again

we become disoriented as which way to go

we become confused about our sense of direction

and darkness of the shadows deepens

sometimes we travel too far along the way

sometimes we come to too many twists and turns

meet too many obstacles and suffer too many trials and tribulations

sometimes we become transformed along the way

forgetting who we were or where we were headed

sometimes we lose our innocence along the way

gaining in worldly experience

we come to know what lies in our hearts

we venture to spaces of reality so remote and strange

there is no returning from our adventures unchanged

if we ever return at all

sitting at the steps of the great gateway

sunning myself beneath the flapping flags

the sky a bright blue

sitting in clarity no longer caring

after all that's been said and done

my life has come to this, at the footsteps

not noticing anymore if the gates

are opened or closed

or whose standing behind them

and whose passing between them

nothing is new about this same old game

only the faces have all changed

conceited, class-conscious clown

parading like a peacock

you are not my father or my brother

your intellect has not come freely in the world

the price you have paid has been the wisdom of your soul

the grand sympathies that allow a person to feel the way

in the footsteps of others

no matter how humble

no matter how ignorant and unschooled

standing upright

squarely upon two legs

feet firmly upon the ground

surveying the distant horizon

encompassing the visible earth

there upon the shoulder

storm clouds are building

there in the distance

a tree is swaying in the wind

a fish is jumping from the water

and the white-caps of the waves are spraying

man seeks his natural level

where ever he may be standing

whether high upon a mountaintop

or in the middle of a valley plain

always about five and a half feet above the ground

no dream man can have

will come to anything

unless it can be carried upon two feet

humankind was not made to bow down

and crawl upon the ground

there is no hieratic order

of princes and paupers

in the natural kingdom

not borne upon the backs of human beings

bent over like beasts of burden

yoked to the end

of some master's chain

fly upon the fragile glass

of a large picture window

through which the sun has shown so many times

outside upon the sidewalk the school children to and fro

in the same way that school children have always done

a small segment of the world

shinning through this transparent pane of glass

it could be ten or twenty or fifty years hence

fly flits in studied indifference

a focal point providing perspective

how fragile is this window of glass

that a little weight or a slight knock

would break into so many odd pieces

and all the history that it has mediated

lost in a single instant

fly buzzes and moves its legs

an intrinsic part of the scheme of things

in a world of fragile glass

I had a vision of paradise

where there are no roads or cars

and all the paths are dust and dirt

where the nearest plumbing

is a distant outhouse

and a running stream

at the bottom of the hill

I have a dream of being

where the trees grow tall and green

where the only chore to do

is to chop some dead wood

and make a meal-time fire

this dream is carried by the afternoon winds

that blow across the trees and make them sway to and fro

where the thunder clouds form late in the afternoon

and lightening strikes violently at the trees nearby

where the only buildings are made of wood

and there are no skyscrapers or shopping centers

this vision was a childhood dream

the road has since been paved with asphalt

all the way to the top of the mountain

everyone now has fixed pipes and plumbing

and lightening rods and aerials on the roofs of their new cabins

I guess this has been an old story

it could have been a hundred years ago

or just yesterday

I am glad that I could have this dream still in my lifetime

I am sad that my child will not have the same dreams

I walked across an undeveloped field

surrounded by modern buildings

and construction sights

I marveled at the unpaved pathways

that cut an "x" diagonally across its center

I rejoiced at its unleveled landscape

rising here, dipping there

an old tree over grown off in one corner

and the unkempt weeds everywhere

I noticed the dust being kicked up

at the heels of the pedestrians

taking the well-worn short-cuts

across the grass

I hoped that the school administrators

had not made any plans

to make nice smooth concrete pathways

where there has been only mud and ice

I hoped that no more money would be spent

in leveling this lot

and turning into perfect park

or a parking lot

better that the gophers make their tunnels

and leave mounds of fresh earth

here and there