Lady's Mountain

You can see the hills from afar Standing out on a large plateau On grassland plains are mountains Which never lie still but tremor But the mountains are animate and they are lady’s mountains You see them only when they shout Only with second look you discover The reality of their tremor and thunder As birds conferencing in the grasslands Disperse in chaos when scared of echoes Though high above, they are hidden Though hidden they are never still Moving they cause earthquakes But no clouds cover their tops Fogs and mists veil their ribs With hills on the frontiers You can see goats nipping at tufts And the bulls scratching hard For puppies to climb to lick tears And sweat bulls and goats create The valleys are heather-filled Bearing no rivers and no lakes But have unfathomable craters And with rolling dangerous magma The volcanic lava flows ceaselessly When old men rush to squat there To warm themselves rapidly in solo When the sun goes to its bed to rest Many are victims of volcanic ash That pours and burns without care You can see swallows twitter above To find lonely space to build nests In the beautiful hills and escarpments And vultures squinting their eyes As they pray for any happy accident To befall guests on lady’s mountain