Take Me Home

This poem came to me while hiking at daybreak in early autumn, through the Roaring Fork area of the San Juan National Forest near Dolores, Colorado. It's a place my husband first introduced me to early in our relationship, and since then, it has become a space where I reflect, reconnect, and ground myself.

The landscape, with its frost-covered grass and whispering winds, was the inspiration for this exploration of the connection between nature, movement, and memory.

As I walked, the rhythm of my steps naturally found its way into the poem, forming the "one-two step" refrain. That steady beat became a metaphor for both physical movement and the passage of time. The repetition of this phrase mirrors how life progresses, one step at a time, and how the journey—whether through nature or memory—has its own forward momentum. This rhythm guided the poem’s free verse structure, which allowed me to capture a natural, flowing feel, much like the landscape itself.

The imagery in the poem—"frost breath," "whisper winds," "barbed wire sag"—is rooted in the rural landscape around me. I felt a deep reverence for this environment, which I described as "holy ground." The natural elements reflect the external world, but they also symbolize the internal journey I was on. The phrase "can't stop now, just don't think" came to me as a reminder to move forward, suggesting that life’s journey should be experienced fully, without overthinking or getting stuck in the past.

As I moved through the landscape, I was also moving through memories, looking back on "constellations, days of old" while still pushing forward. The final lines, "holy ground, three-four, found," signify a sense of completion—reaching a place of discovery, not only at the top of the mountain but within myself as well.

The poem is meant to capture that feeling of progress and reflection, of walking through both physical and emotional landscapes. It speaks to the act of moving forward while carrying the past with us, and the grounding that can come when we truly embrace the journey.