The Ride

On your tippy toes, you reach, and your sight line raises just above a blanket of billowing clouds that are tucking in the land. You are a bird, the tip of the tallest tree, the hiker at the tallest peak, backstroking, and whales spouting into the infinitely available.

Here, perceptive as preying panthers, are Canada Jays that swoop and perch on boney-fingered snags. Here, the alpine tundra’s outstretched arms receive the unrelenting elements without objection.

Into these figments, I float like Mary Poppins carrying her umbrella overhead, and into their chalked images, I jump.

Riding the rickety roller coaster of imagination until my face splays and my stomach wees, I walk then run to reenter its queue.