Earrings

On the summit of K2

I will build a cairn, steady the longest step-ladder

in the world, and climb to gather the purest, finest, most

perfectly faceted ice crystals the high skies can deliver, to

make you a pair of earrings. Two arrays of crystals, in which each

one is measured to a round fraction of the next, like a minuscule set

of tubular bells. Then I will ask you to come north with me to where

northern lights pulse, for there the earrings, resonating, will hum

stratospheric into your ears, notes so indescribably beautiful

that you will forget the crush of this world around you,

experience loneliness so exquisite that your return

will be almost unbearable.