Lament of the White Peak Men
We stand in the ages now. Tell them
We cannot come back to the trails
Level on earth,
Nor go again to our birth.
The tune in the willow stem
Is high and harsh and given to the ledge,
The heart is winter’s and the frost assails
The Arctic minds we bear. Tell them our pledge
Invokes the jasper scarp, the frozen vein,
The colder blue, the night
Pouring its astral rain.
Say, we shall not be young again—
So long has icy light
Impaled our vision and our boundaries
Exceeded trees.
Early among the junipers we slept
