Why This Cult Of Wilderness?...

Late In August The Lure Of The Mountains Becomes Irresistible. Seared By The Everlasting Sunfire, I Want To See Running Water Again, Embrace A Pine Tree, Cut My Initials In The Bark Of An Aspen, Get Bit By A Mosquito, See A Mountain Bluebird, Find A Big Blue Columbine, Get Lost In The Firs, Hike Above Timberline, Sunbathe On Snow And Eat Some Ice, Climb The Rocks And Stand In The Wind At The Top Of The World On The Peak Of Tukuhnikivats.

War: First Day In The U.s. Army, The Government Placed A Bible In My Left Hand, A Bayonet In The Other.

Sentiment Without Action Is The Ruin Of The Soul.

Our Suicidal Poets (plath, Berryman, Lowell, Jarrell, Et Al.) Spent Too Much Of Their Lives Inside Rooms And Classrooms When They Should Have Been Trudging Up Mountains, Slogging Through Swamps, Rowing Down Rivers. The Indoor Life Is The Next Best Thing To Premature Burial.

In America, As Elsewhere, The General Irritability Level Keeps Rising.