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The Alpinist
Michael Carman

He hugs the wall of the mountain like a lover
cheek to cheek flesh to granite
against the rime and ice and altitude.

Snow is falling all over the mountain
as he climbs free solo—without ropes, alone—
”Immersed,” as he wrote, “in a world so deeply beautiful—”

He has researched every element of his art.
There may be nothing else to know
but what the mountain knows.

The night before, at supper, a moviemaker
films his modest, goofy grin, his Greek god curls,
his smiling shrug as he selects

the three-layer chocolate cake
with Hershey’s kisses melting on the top,
”because,” he says, “you never know.”

The endless swirling snow—
the optimistic blue— the sun—
his powdered fingers seeking just above his head
a toehold for his rubber shoe.


Marc-Andre Leclerc, 1992-2018

—
Michael Carman has taught poetry as an Assistant Professor of English at Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City, in Poets & Writers community workshops, and for the men of Sing Sing and other prisons. She has published two chapbooks, The Not, a finalist in the New Women’s Voices Competition at Finishing Line Press, and An Uncommon Accord/You in Translation, published by Toadlily Press. Her work has appeared in The Cortland Review, The Ekphrastic Review, Spillway, and other venues.

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