Michael Estabrook on the Other Side of the
anyway I'm backpacking
with 3 or 4 others who I don't know
and we pass beneath this high archway
of rock a bright cave-like entrance
into a wide rubbly plain at the bottom
of an expansive pit the walls mostly boulders
rising-up all around rising-up as high
as you can see and I walk out into
the plain when suddenly one
giant boulder up at the top breaks loose
and drops straight down the people
I'm with are still protected in the archway
they see the boulder and start yelling
waving their arms "get out of the way
get out of the way!" but I'm paralyzed
with fright unable to move a muscle
not knowing what to do about
this giant boulder dropping straight down
out of the sky at me but then I snap
out of it run full speed out of the way
and the boulder hits the solid rock floor
with a tremendous cracking boom bounds off
towards the other side and I stagger
into the protection of the archway
my companions hug me hold me then
I sit with my head in my hands,
pale, sweating, shaking.
© Copyright Michael Estabrook 2007