SOLO-PACKING.

Sep 4

Confucius quips:

“A great man is hard on himself;
a small man is hard on others.”

I love solo-packing

because it takes off the shelf

the reality that I am often

critical of sisters and brothers.

When you are in the wild, alone for miles

there is no one to blame

for my self-aggrandizing

Only the high country breeze

observes the smile

that comes to my face

with ruthless realizing

that I am no better than the people I judge

and I am just as much to blame

for relational strife;

how if you look close

my shirts always have a smudge—

an unfortunately apt metaphor for my life.

It is in the wild country where

I meet divine monsters

who remind me I am

limited, mortal, and small,

and when darkness takes the hills,

the haunt stirs

in my soul: I am as fragile

as tent canvas after all.

I am learning to be healthfully harder on me,

with hope that

in the painful solo-unpacking,

I become the person I pretend to be

and chock-full of the grace I was lacking.

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—Swift-Footed Markilles

Mark Shaffer

MUSE 10.