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“Close to the western summit there is the dried and frozen carcass of a leopard. No one has explained what the leopard was seeking at that altitude.” 
                                 — Ernest Hemingway, The Snows of Kilimanjaro


Close, but close to what, he asks himself
to God, or to the end of things?
the question looms, an icy wind that stings
western sun belies the deathly chill within his bones
summit slain, an unread book upon the shelf

there is this urge that drives a man,
is hard to grasp and harder to expound -
the constant forward press that leaves each
dried, unquenched, though verdant green surrounds,
and yet, to feel within one’s core, the source just out of reach

frozen by fear of somehow missing out, his
carcass now grows cold, a mind adrift, in search
of times of youth and days of old -
a man possessed will rid these thoughts no sooner than a
leopard sheds his spots

No real concern is given to the
one who comes behind, who likewise seeks -
has he a thought of how his end will be
explained? to whom? they either understand or know not
what lies just ahead beyond this snowy peak

the sadness of the unattended field such sown - the
leopard lives and dies alone, but for the joys of spring
was this Creator’s plan for us? i don’t think so -
seeking, He’s found in places pressed and low,
at heights, without, does but exhaustion bring

that one might scale the highs, seek out, explore - 
altitude, we find, a perfect metaphor

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