Mountains in my Mind

By Jamie Cull-Host

Day breaks over a babbling brook, winding its way through a green mountain. A dove coos its morning song as minnows dart back and forth through the water. I sit on a rock, solemn and contemplative, with my feet in the stream halfway up the trail. The rock, just now graced by light, provides an outlook. From on high, I pass my gaze along the route I have taken so far. As I eye the rocks, stream crossings, and uncountable switchbacks I traversed, I feel numb. For as I look up the mountain, all at once crumbling and growing taller, I see what more there is to go, and I simply can’t imagine it.

My mind is ripped away from the mountain. I look at the hurricane on the map, I sit numb in my chair.

The gyrating mass of white and gray Approaches the coast of Florida, Bringing pain and destruction that gets worse every year. The mountain grows taller.

On the news they say an ice storm hit Texas, The electrical grid wasn’t prepared, Power is out all over the state. People are freezing to death. I call my mom.

I ask if she has heard from our family in Austin and Houston. She hasn’t yet.

The mountain grows taller.

I sit in my house watching the map of fires Burning just over the next mountain, Waiting for the evacuation call. The mountain grows taller.

Will I be too late?

Is all that I have worked for minuscule in the face of the mounting calamities? I won’t believe that.

Though the mountain is tall and the disasters constant, all is not lost. There is still time.

There are still minnows swimming next to me in the water, and doves singing in the trees. There is still hope.

I will persevere.

In spite of, and because of all of this, I will persevere. H

Art by Lindsey Papasian