10.23.2014

San Juan Sunrise


I get up  before sunrise to hike the ridge above camp.
In the dark, the boats make small noises against each other,
as if they too are sleeping on their river bed.

The climb over the broken red rock is short,
navigating up and between immense slabs
hundreds of feet tall,
thrust from the earth and aligned for miles at a 45 degree cant.

I sit at the top in the growing light,
easing myself into a dusty practice of awareness,
trying to stay with the breath in,
the breath out.
A clatter of rocks behind me is too much curiosity
and I peek over my shoulder.
A lone brown horse stands silhouetted on the next swell over,
and then a line of horses coming out of the west,
trending toward the river and water,
always water here in the desert.

There is a full rainbow in the dry palate:
the red of the rock and lighter orange too.
Bright yellow/gold of the cotton woods,
blending into green where fall has not touched their leaves.
The overcast sky, herself a myriad of hues,
carries a thousand shades of blue in the blanket of clouds
and occasional hole to the day beyond.
The desert varnish patina on a dry fall
up the wash east from me is purple,
the cliffs upriver presenting the same in the growing sunrise.

To the south, coyotes star crying,
shrill screams over the bass riff of the river.
The horses have made it to the water
and drink warily as my camp mates stir.


I believe there is only one choice in life:
to be happy, or not.
It's the reason we are here
on this infinitely beautiful, complexly intricate
sphere of mass.
It our purpose in this lifestory
and really, (when you get down
to the honest, bedrock truth of it,)
our duty.

It is no small choice and no small task
to choose the path of happiness
no matter what challenges arise.
Each moment you have to be ready to re-commit,
to take responsibility:
"I choose to rest in the very heart of God.
I choose the Truth, the terrible Beauty,
the unforgiving goodness that is peace,
that is the untouchable happiness of existence."

And who, once they know
that it is all only this simple question,
this one choice,
would say nay? 

It is as bright now as it will get on this October day
and the coyotes have stopped singing.
The horses are lost in the floodplain
of green scrub, Russian Olives, and tamarisk.
The parties of people up and down the river are cooking, talking.

It would be an easier existence, perhaps,
to stay on this ridge forever.
To dissolve into a sharp stone,
worn only by time and wind and water
and carried to the sea.
But we are more than that,
should we choose to meet what is offered. 





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