Arctic light cuts the ridge-backs of
the mountains black against the distance.
Climbing late on a borrowed day, we watch
a pale sun colour the near fells
buttermilk, sketching the coarse tufts
of winter grass against a blur
of wind-burned heather.

Up the shale of the last slope —
a natural slag heap, scraping
under our feet — the frozen traceries
of lingering snow glitter and crack.

The summit survey point;
scored like a sundial
with remembered distances,
angles of view
that tell you where you are,
— how far it is
from where you were.

Lucidly marking out
familiar farms I left
and couldn't go back to
still in their proper places —
who I was then, am now
suddenly together here.

Three thousand and fifty feet below,
the lakes drain light from the sky
and the Solway is a slow furnace-pour
powered by the sun.  Going down
fast, against the turn of the earth
the mountain's shadow rushes in front of us,
advancing faster than our feet,
the dark drifting in behind the walls
and a swollen moon rising over Carrock.
 
 

© Kathleen Jones