Unreachable

I write atop mountains/behind bars of ego/the Valley lay before me/the masses, unreachable/I wander/unfamiliar trails/and wonder/how far/to the end/of all this/winds kiss/my neck and nibble/my lobes/I am aroused by freedom/atop this mountain/We copulate ecstatic with/eyes of green/green/green/and skyes of blue/blue/blue/I love you/all/though I will never reach you.

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Today I took a 2 hour bus ride to the Carmel Valley and spent some time at Garland Ranch Regional Park.  I walked Lupine Loop to the start of the Waterfall trail, which took me a mile with a pretty good climb in elevation.  The waterfall was obviously not flowing this time of year, but the area was beautiful anyway.  I’m looking forward to returning in the Spring. 

From there, I started out towards the trail to Mesa Pond, but got distracted by a small path leading up to a promising meadow.  I climbed a tree and rested for a short time, then found a lovely bench atop a clearing that looked northeast back toward the entrance to the park and Carmel Valley road.  The hills on the other side of the road stood majestic and green, dotted with houses and vineyards.  It was here that I took the above picture and wrote the above poem.

From there I hiked about another mile to Mesa Pond.  It was rather low and uninspiring, so I moved on quickly down the Mesa trail until I hit Siesta Point, where I found a lovely bench to rest my weary legs for the decent back to the Valley.  Siesta Point also faces Northeast and I saw off in the distance the speck of my bus heading down the road back towards Monterey.  That told me that I had one hour till the next bus, so I packed up and started down Buckeye trail towards the visitors center.  

It was dusk when I started down the trail and full dark by the time I reached the visitors center and filled up my water bottle.  I walked back to the main road and sat at the bus stop, listening to the sounds of a small creek trickling by in the silence between passing cars until the mighty Twenty-Four stopped to chauffeur me back to my Marina home.

Today felt wonderful and lived.