Inyo Rising

The narrating voices that, entwined or in juxtaposition, tell us about the universe are only two. Light and gravity. In the story that emerges, the invisible holds sway. What we can observe is simply an exception.
—Ersilia Vaudo

 

But man cannot master this lesson, 
the lesson of stone: 
he tumbles, his body crumbles, 
his word and voice unravel.

Fire, water and tree 
steal themselves:
dying, they seek a mineral body 
and find the road to glory: 
steady, the stone shines 
like a hard new rose.
—Pablo Neruda  

I want the light 
locked inside to awaken:
crystalline flower,
wake as I do:

eyelids raise the curtain 
of endless earthen time 
until deeply buried eyes 
flash clear enough again 
to see their own clarity.
—Pablo Neruda

NOTES
—Top photo, to honor Earth Day:  Earthrising beyond Moon, from Artemis II, NASA, March 2026

—Photos: Petroglyphs on a rock wall, Owens Valley, Inyo County CA, March 2026, Douglas Beauchamp
—Ersilia Vaudo (Astrophysicist with  the European Space Agency), from The Story of Astrophysics in Five Revolutions (2025, trans from Italian by Vanessa Di Stefano)
—Pablo Neruda (1904-1973, Nobel 1971), from Stones of the Sky.
1970/Spanish, 1987/English trans by James Nolan, Copper Canyon Press

Power of a Mountain

 

(Birch Mountain, right, March 2026)

 

When I was still a young man, I saw Birch Mountain in a dream. It said to me:
"You will always be well and strong. Nothing can hurt you and you will live to an old age." After this Birch Mountain came and spoke to me whenever I was in trouble and told me that I would be all right. That is why nothing has happened to me and why I am so old now. —Jack Stewart

 

In 1926-27, in Owens Valley, anthropologist Julian Steward listened to and recorded the life story of Jack Stewart, an elderly Paiute man. His Indian name: Hoavadunuki’.  Jack Stewart born in his mother’s village, tovowahamatui, now Big Pine, and lived there at the time Steward heard his story, noting, “The data presented in Jack's life demonstrate primarily this importance of the vision. he is evidently of a mind predisposed to hallucinations, interpreted as supernatural communications.”

 

Julian Steward continues: 
Although the irrepressible dreamer had many visions, this one which brought him his "power" was the most important. Birch mountain, pa'o'karanwa (pa'o, rocky, karanwa, boulder) or sunuyüsi’, is one of the most magnificent of the Sierra Nevada peaks as seen from Big Pine, rising to more than 14,000 feet, or more than 10,000 feet above the valley. Success in hunting, fighting, traveling, and even in gambling are assured him by his power, Birch Mountain. 

 

 

This petroglyph, a loose drawn style on a sloping crevice on a rock rim facing Birch Mountain.  A rim with dozens of other petroglyphs. Follow along with the possibilities as I speculate.

 

I see a spirit figure. Below two upright ears, which shape a head, two arms extend. One downward emitting or contacting supernatural power through the hand.  The other arm loops down entwining body-like. Upper left, a vaporous cloud of energy animates or is animated by the figure. This is not a logical event. A vision; this description is imaginative representing, I suggest, a quest for contact, or indeed power’s actual arrival.

I do not suggest there's any direct relationship between Jack Stewart's dream of Birch Mountain and this petroglyph. His story provides no account of petroglyphs.  It is an alignment of geography that provokes an alignment of action and belief.  A way of turning toward.       

 

Photos: Inyo County, California, southeast of Big Pine, facing Birch Mountain.

March 2026, Douglas Beauchamp

 

The thin snowpack of the eastern Sierras continues to melt away this pivotal year of global heating.

Carbon in the atmosphere is the highest since 30 million years ago.