T
The_Wraith
Guest
Far off bugles haunt my sleep as I lay in my bag that clings tenuously to the side of the steep hill where I'm laying. I'm in the dream state, half awake/half asleep where outside influences the inside. So here I lay, with dreams of royal bull elk broadside at a distance that is measured in feet rather than yards, where the slightest blink or breath can send him packing into the next county.
Just as I begin my draw my eyes open, it's still dark but something is alive out there, something besides me, something big, something noisy. I can hear it walk in the dense timber below and I wonder, is it the royal from my dreams? Does his antlers reach for the sky, dagger pointed tines that seem to point straight to the heavens? Where does he go? Where does he come from? What is his errand? Why is he walking through the timber in the blackness of a new moon? Then I wonder why am I here? I know from whence I came but what is my destination? Why do I do this? Why do I stretch out, uncomfortabley albeit, on the side of mountains, alone? I've always had this unquenchable wanderlust that drives me to these far off remote places. Perhaps in a former life I was a long hunter, always searching for the next sunrise, the next hunk of venison roasted over an open fire, that fire being the only source of light within hundreds of miles. Always alone.
People ask, why do you do it? Why go alone into places that in the blink of an eye, with just one wrong step of your foot can send you to meet your maker and no one the wiser? I look at them with pity mostly, disgust sometimes. There is no explaining to them, they don't want to hear, to listen, to really know. They just want to hear themselves talk. I shrug, say you won't understand. Most of the time they laugh, sometimes to my face but mostly they laugh when I can't hear. It's ok, I understand, they can laugh all they want.
My thoughts return to this midnight wanderer. I can hear him only faintly now, for a while there he was close enough to hear breath, to smell his aroma, it was an elk, it was a bull for I heard antler scrape wood. My watch reveals that I have a couple hours till my rendevous with the sun. With the coming of the sun, comes the gift of life, a gift endowed upon me by my creator and I realize that soon, to soon I will meet my creator and I pray that when I go through those gates that he'll be there, the royal from my dreams and I also pray, that I won't be, alone.
Just as I begin my draw my eyes open, it's still dark but something is alive out there, something besides me, something big, something noisy. I can hear it walk in the dense timber below and I wonder, is it the royal from my dreams? Does his antlers reach for the sky, dagger pointed tines that seem to point straight to the heavens? Where does he go? Where does he come from? What is his errand? Why is he walking through the timber in the blackness of a new moon? Then I wonder why am I here? I know from whence I came but what is my destination? Why do I do this? Why do I stretch out, uncomfortabley albeit, on the side of mountains, alone? I've always had this unquenchable wanderlust that drives me to these far off remote places. Perhaps in a former life I was a long hunter, always searching for the next sunrise, the next hunk of venison roasted over an open fire, that fire being the only source of light within hundreds of miles. Always alone.
People ask, why do you do it? Why go alone into places that in the blink of an eye, with just one wrong step of your foot can send you to meet your maker and no one the wiser? I look at them with pity mostly, disgust sometimes. There is no explaining to them, they don't want to hear, to listen, to really know. They just want to hear themselves talk. I shrug, say you won't understand. Most of the time they laugh, sometimes to my face but mostly they laugh when I can't hear. It's ok, I understand, they can laugh all they want.
My thoughts return to this midnight wanderer. I can hear him only faintly now, for a while there he was close enough to hear breath, to smell his aroma, it was an elk, it was a bull for I heard antler scrape wood. My watch reveals that I have a couple hours till my rendevous with the sun. With the coming of the sun, comes the gift of life, a gift endowed upon me by my creator and I realize that soon, to soon I will meet my creator and I pray that when I go through those gates that he'll be there, the royal from my dreams and I also pray, that I won't be, alone.
