Fire and ice atop stoic summits is an intriguing interplay, for the fire doesn’t burn and the ice tends to warm… the light is forever in flux while the ice is a statis in perpetuity… twixt the two, the notions of time stand flummoxed… dawn and dusk, both extremities bestowed with a benevolent sun, one that tends to excite but not incite… hope and rumination, foreboding and forbearance… there is a lot that a simple play of light and shadow concocts around this tectonic kerfuffle of the yore… gazing wistfully at it, the only challenge is to avoid being overwhelmed…
What doesn’t get overwhelmed though are clouds… once abducted from the terra firma, they seem to lose all fear, going cavalier against their evaporator, blocking access to its third orbitor… yet this is inevitably a David versus Goliath, and once gravity has sucked the former dry, another theatre takes over… one where the clouds either stagger drunkenly, or swoon around the icy pinnacles like a dervish…
‘Tis those last wisps of clouds that set in motion a quiet pore over one’s own transience, relieved at finding sufficient time between now and the next bout of inclement weather… sunrises are a mixed bag, for the tribulations of the day ahead are yet to be revealed, but sunsets for the most part are meditative, a melange of contexts and perspectives… the tolerability of civilizational absurdities while being free from their throes and the consequent urge to tread higher and farther away… or the delusion of stumbling across myriad meanings to life with a handful of guided sojourns to the outdoors… these insignificant stands of cloud, seemingly innocent, almost always portend a storm… but as long as the fire burns behind them… the day seems alright…
Musing on mountain twilights, hiking in the Himalaya
