I climb down the hill from the house
The land here always leaves you walking sideways and towards some
Body
Of water.
It's a bit treacherous
It is green and it is squishy
And there are many purple flowers
And arctic cotton
Broken up by Red and desert like rocks.
It's quite easy to slide and lose your footing on descent.
We walk along a little gravel pathway at the bottom
My borrowed sled dog and I
And she picks up bones and drops them
Scattered and bleached white
Powdery and light like chalk
A hip bone
A jaw
Part of an ankle
You spend a lot of time looking at your feet out here
And it's easy to forget.
Where you've been and where you are going
I'm a bit wary
Even with the dog. By myself looking for polar bears. It's unlikely
It's very very unlikely. But they have been spotted not so very far away.
And there are icebergs in the bay
In August. Stranger things have happened. Global warming.
Leads to polar bear warnings.
Climbing back up to the top again
Is when and where things get truly difficult
Heart pounding and breathing through the mouth
The south is soft and the south leaves me very soft
My body unable to work the way it should do
While here I am climbing
And I am trying to climb a little bit higher every day.
