Gravity

HR Harper

At evening we made a fire at the edge of a blue lake high in the mountains near the border. We made the camp to heed the songs of robins and night herons — you would not admit you were cold. The stratocumulus sunset stayed until dark, and then a black sky of chilled stars fell down upon our world. A rat rustled in the reeds near us, but that night nothing could scare us.

The dust of a windy day, covered us. We looked up at the black dome of emptiness. I said, “maybe wonder will solve us.” You scoffed, the white puff of cloudy air, the denial inside you, fell into the fire. You would not admit you worried about your death. Instead, you pulled me to it breathing with the fading birdsong and letting a mysterious force draw us together, then to the ground. We lifted arms, heavy as stones, and knew gravity would not leave us alone. Pulled to each other for warmth, our brave fear made us complete and lovely, and we lived by the unspoken trust in what heaves us home. After another wave of gravity you snored like a duck in your down bag. I stayed up as the night got colder and the stars rushed away, pulled apart in all directions, their causes and effects chiming with the chemistry unleashed at the moment time began. From here there was no place that did not pull us to it.

Tomorrow we climb the ridge in front of us and cross into a new country. Our weight will hold us on the path until we’re there. But now I raise my hand to the constellations above. My finger traces Orion’s belt. My hand is heavy. Though your hand pulls it to you.

Published in Issue No. 6, Scriba Vita, March 1st, 2025.

HR Harper is a writer living in the redwoods above Santa Cruz, California. A student of meditation and the emptying traditions, he writes to understand the nature of human consciousness in a natural world humans seem to be destroying. He began to publish in 2021. Several of his recently published poems and stories may be found at: https://brusheswiththedarklaw.blogspot.com