Anthony Hanible

The Top Of The Mountain The Bottom Of The Valley

At the top of the mountain

You are the moment before the leap

A symbol suspended

A breath held by the sky

The wind circles you like a question

That has waited centuries to be asked

Your body becomes a threshold

A hinge between what you were

And what you are willing to fall toward

At the bottom of the valley

The earth opens like a mouth of memory

Soil gathers itself into a cradle

A dark grammar of endings

That are not endings

Every handful of dirt is a metaphor

For the selves you’ve outgrown

The ones that cling like old prayers

To the edges of your ribs

Jumping becomes a ritual

Not descent

But surrender

A shedding of altitude

A translation of height into depth

You fall like a symbol dropped

Into the language of the underworld

And the valley receives you

As if you were a seed

Finally remembering its purpose

Burying becomes a second ritual

A way of writing yourself

Into the ground’s quiet scripture

You cover what must be covered

Not to hide it

But to let it transform

In the dark’s slow alchemy

Every burial is a doorway

Every leap is a vow

And so you live between them

The mountain’s sharp breath

The valley’s deep pulse

A figure made of falling and rising

Of burying and becoming

Forever rewriting yourself

In the symbols of height and hollow