Walked the Mountain

What shape is that, the mountain’s brow?
A glacier field, a glacier field!
I walked to read the mountains mood;
Of what I read my lips are sealed.

What threads make up the mountain’s collar?
Columbine! They’re Columbine!
I walked to color in my day;
Do join my witnessing this sign.

What full length of the mountain’s staff?
The eagle’s range! The eagle’s range!
I walked to test my stamina;
My spent breath offers up no change.

What form reveals the mountain’s boots?
It’s you and me, community.
I’ve hiked the leagues for wisdom’s wage,
Your share of alpine bursary.

 

Buena Vista, Colorado

Where the mountains make their point,
Grey head stone over tunic green,
There’s enough sunshine to anoint
Your sense with gist sprung from the scene.

You’re not around so very long:
These should be as eternity;
But something’s coming very wrong
From peak to saddle point in scree.

Where’s all the white account of wet?
To such dead grey glaciers reduce;
Not here so very long and yet
Eternity’s seen high abuse.

 

Uche Ogbuji, born in Calabar, Nigeria, lived in Egypt, England and elsewhere before settling near Boulder, Colorado. A computer engineer and entrepreneur by trade, his poetry chapbook, Ndewo, Colorado (Aldrich Press, 2013) is a Colorado Book Award Winner, and a Westword 2015 Award Winner (“Best Environmental Poetry”). His poems, published worldwide, fuse Igbo culture, European classicism, American Mountain West setting, and Hip-Hop influences. Among other editing projects he co-hosts the Poetry Voice podcast. A selection of his poems was included in the Best New African Poets 2015 anthology. He was a finalist for Nigeria’s 2016 Eriata Oribhabor Poetry Prize.

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3 Responses

  1. Michelle T Simon

    Excellent work. I appreciate the break from the much-adored, yet somewhat monotonus and rigid meter of the traditional English sonnet. It almost seemed as if I was right there walking the mountain with you. And the imagery in “Buena Vista…” is very sharp. These tasty little morsels give me reason to check out more of your poetry in the very near future.
    Keep doing what you do. ☺

    Reply
  2. Bob McGinness

    Re: Walked the Mountain – I loved the structure and symmetry both within the stanza and the progression within the whole. Top to bottom you might say.

    Reply
  3. Debbie Johnson

    I truly enjoyed both of these and especially the repetition in the first one. One line really stands out: It’s you and me, community. If only more people understood that concept. Beautifully written

    Reply

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