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Spanish Peaks

Spanish Peaks do not rise, they jut.
And not with grace,
but a kind of holy defiance.
Volcanic scars and cockeyed ridges
mock the gaze.
Ponderosa and fir
cling like memory
to the flanks
of wind-scoured stone.

These are not mountains
that rise like love —
no gentle slope, no aspen turning
in autumn’s breath.
They do not beckon. They lunge —
desire made flesh,
cloud-ripping.

They feast on my awe,
then vanish into shadow.
I cannot follow.

If mountains could abandon,
these would be the first —
unfaithful prophets,
vast and unrepentant,
leaving me with nothing…
except…everything
that I just saw.

—
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in Midnight Mind, Trampoline, and Flights. Three latest books are Bittersweet, Subject Matters, and Between Two Fires. Work upcoming in Levitate, White Wall Review, and Willo Review.

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