June 21, 1987: The 55th Fourteener

One of many trip reports under the SilGro home page for Alan Silverstein and Cathie Grow.
Email me at ajs@frii.com.
Last update: March 21, 2024
(Previous trip report: 1987_0620-21_QuandaryPeak.htm)
(A Fourteener trip report.)

By night I return to Quandary Peak. Now atop the world once more, I watch in silence the chill dawning of a new day. Ten months gone by since El Diente Peak and the reaching of my Fourteeners dream. A lazy interval, reliving memories of glories past.

Now I'm free to seek new twists on old adventures. To return to favorite summits in the strangest ways. A solo trek in depth of darkness. Solitude, peace, bitter breezes. A mountain asleep. A monument rising to the stars.

Dayglow paints the sky beyond distant ranges. Crystal blue, edge of red, silence. Agony of ascent now past, glory earned, splendor growing.

I've been here before. Why have I returned? What brought me up this mountain once again? Every step, effort. The last, the worst.

Some say we're here to climb a path to God. The final step of Realization, impossible. The mountain is a metaphor. A taste of the infinite Path, perhaps. Mountain and life, a series of false summits. Peak experiences; descents to the mundane.

I'm 31. I feel old, so old. So tired. I've been here before. I may yet pass this way again.

I'm young. I'm free. The day breaks. Rebirth and renewal. Endless summits. The cycle repeats.

-- Alan Silverstein
Quandary Peak, Colorado, 14265'
5:30 am Sunday, June 21, 1987

(An edited version of this poem ran in the December 1990 issue of "Trail and Timberline", the monthly magazine of the Colorado Mountain Club.)

(Next trip report: 1987_0627_SELongsPeak.htm)