A Climbing Poem

When you didn’t come home
When I didn’t hear from you
I was strangely unafraid
Lonely for sure, but not afraid
I knew where you were … more or less.

I called your office
They said your wife said
“You’d gone missing”
Though they were still searching
I knew this might happen

I waited for a phone message
Even email
None arrived

Then one day a postal card
With a foreign town’s cancel stamp
As the return address
Your writing was teeny
And covered every inch of space
It had directions

I called my office the very next day
Told them I was leaving
Laughed with the receptionist
Who said she wanted to leave too
“Take my name,” I told her
And perhaps she did.

I left my not job
My not apartment
I had so very few strings
So few attachments
And I craved you so

There is more
I arrived at the airport
Used my credit card
To buy a one-way ticket
And some money
To buy two plane rides
And three bus rides

When I was on the beach
At the bottom of the mountains
I pulled the post card from my pocket
As you asked me to
And read again

“Find the most beautiful beach
Follow the steepest road
Downhill is always the wrong direction
Pay attention to the smell of lavender
Look for pages of an old passport
Land snails climbing the highway reflector posts
Look for praying mantises
And note the direction they are pointing
See the flocks of dragonflies
Listen to the bells of goats
Listen for the biggest herd
The greatest range of sounds
Be that music

Walk on up as hard as it may be
The cyclists coming down will be singing
The cyclists going up will be saying “difficult”
This is a sign you are on the right road
Where the seeing-eye cacti stop growing is a church
You will see it from miles away
Four windows in the bell tower
High above the trees
Light pouring in
Real light

The priest will take you in
He will know nothing
But word of your being will seep out
And my shepherd will hear
He will go to confession
He will bind the Father
“Tell her only where to find Him,
Only tell her.”
And the father will,

“Passed the goldenrod,” he will say
“No one ever goes there
There are marigolds
Pine trees
A ladder straddles a fence
A stone house
The smell of freshly made cheese
Of sheep
A fire”

It is there you will find
A freshly made bed
Myrtle
Clean linen
The earthen floor swept clean
You may even find me
Or find dried bones
Just in case
Bring the heart meds.