By the Dead Sea

This poem was inspired by a trip I recently took to Masada. The beauty of the landscape amazed me and made the architecture of the fortress far more impressive.

I stand upon Earth’s deepest height,

My spirit yearning to take wing,

To leap up toward the greater light.

The craggy cliffs in silence sing

To me of beauty brave and bare,

Of solid sculpted forms that stand,

That, crowned by solar beauty, bear

The fingerprints of Heaven’s hand,

And distantly I think I see

An echo of the closer song,

A blue-gray ridge, its melody

More faint from distance, yet as strong.

Its cliffs cascade down toward the sea

That scatters salt upon the shore

In crystals that plant poetry

In me. I stand. I adore.