Expedition
       

The friends I lost would not
have made it to the top anyway,

scattered on the mountainside
in night, like uncharted stars.

Though they'd sworn loyalty, at
the first remembrance of their

padded lives even the truest
of them became liabilities.

Well below where the air grows thin,
and the insanity thick as the loss

of breath, their spirits broken,
a voice silent as the vulture's

seemed to soothe them to death.
They returned to the safety in

numberless faces, eyes already
sinking like grave markers.

I saw the Lamb of God in the shadow
of the scavenger's wing they fled,

and I led my expedition of one far
above those who wouldn't risk perishing

in the blinding snows at the summit,
where I kissed the place of rebirth.

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Copyright © 2017 William Huhn All rights reserved
from The Carolina Quarterly
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission