Song for a Mountain Climber

Since fondness is rooted in folly,
shouldn't we should pray
that God's indifferent? Beyond
the fawning flock, past Everest and air,

shouldn't he stay a wholly yawning
dark? (The orders of indifference
more mightily amaze than those
of love. Love favors; love

excludes. On a lark, love tries
its millstone; on a sky its tint.
Love takes an object, takes a shine
to a calf whose gold its own eye-smitheries

have minted. Pure indifference
moves otherwise. It's unconditional:
a little fling cannot diminish it:
impartially it flies from everything—

from man's investments, and
his dearth.) The thought that God
might care for us is
terrifying: ought

to keep us hooked on earth.

Copyright © 2003 Heather McHugh All rights reserved
from Eyeshot
Wesleyan University Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission