Monday, 4 August 2014
mountain study
Every now and then
I go up into the mountains:
fire and snow-
trudging for hours
along the black line of the river
following it right to the crest
or, when the snow's gone
moving up through the forest
to the thin grass and the rocks
the high country-
up there in the stillness
thinking of nothing
only the body moving
extract (section 2) from Kenneth White's Mountain Study, from The Bird Path - Collected Longer Poems 1964-1988
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What a wonderful bit of poetry! Kenneth White is unfamiliar to me (well, was). I'll have to look out for more.
ReplyDeletehe's less well known in Scotland than he should be. "Pilgrim of the void" is good too, a book of extended prose with interpersed poems not unlike some of Basho's work.
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