Venture #2 | Robin Cole

Our little feats
of whatever miracle technology,
have nothing
on this, this upheaved slab of sandstone.
Something big, a very
big something happened here.

It was a chilling moment,
to be pulled back millenia
to the big event, a moment
pulled out of the car engine,
computer tower, TagHeuer swiss
mechanics ticking away on
my tiny wrist.
Unfocused on literature,
checkbooks and dog training,
writing and words, numbers
and science.

Here was a point where it happened.
The earth shifted, grated, lifted.

And here was a cracked face created,
a stretch broken into a vertical stance.
We found the pocket, ledges,
and holds. Our skitterty hands
and feet clung fearlessly

with chaulk bags, harnesses, ropes,
figure eights, biners, shoes,
and belayed egos. But it took

Instinct,quick pops, and jerky
demands. To top out,
our hands were unrecognizable
as they locked into stone, each
fingerprint ridge wedged, each
nail retreated and flushing
white then red. Shoes
smearing the rock with a
dime's worth of rubber. Each
head rush bringing up far too much
logic, each muscle clench
draining the blood back down
to go up, reach, step, go,
step, move, go. Up the face,
over the crux, upon the rock
we stand still.