Lookout, See - Dismantle Magazine

“My 6th grade teacher asked me to

Name the highest mountain in the world

I didn’t even hesitate, ‘Lookout Mountain’”

—Ishmael Reed, “Chattanooga”

“& now Denver is lonesome for her heroes”

—Allen Ginsberg, “Howl”

While finishing grad school, I lived in Chattanooga, Tennessee, a small town hidden beneath Lookout Mountain. Inspired by the mountain’s proximity, I wrote short poems about it, allowing the solidity and strength of what I saw to take whatever form I needed for the day. I finished grad school, then moved to Denver, Colorado, on the promise of a teaching job. Feeling nostalgic one day, I Googled “Chattanooga” again and discovered another Lookout Mountain outside of Golden, Colorado, close to me still. This is a summary of all that transformation, of everything you have meant to me.

Photograph from the top of a mountain, overlooking rolling hills with a lone pine tree in the center of the foreground and a pine branch sneaking in from the top of the frame.

Poem

I take things

too literally:

Your heart flutters

like birds, your

notched spine,

the many things I

find sketching your

sullen, busy mind

Photograph of a building with slanted windows, a tree reaching across the facade and a car whizzing past.

Photograph of the side of a building with a patch of grass before it.

Poem

Rising out of fog,

I see you now

from far away—

You stand there,

with luxurious,

wooden top,

rich and firm,

with me on the

rocky ground

Photograph of a large rock in the middle of the woods that has a diagonal crack slicing down the middle.

Poem (Unknown)

You sit there,

digital, lit up

by flashing lights—

the world is dark,

but, inside, you

are made of strange,

staggering rock,

and there is no night

At a roadside lookout, three couples teeter on the edge of the abyss.

Poem

I’m thinking

of you now,

but I’m thinking

of your scar—

along a path

well-trodden,

worn-down,

the tourists march up

to your stately heights,

cutting into the forest

which is your life.

The nose of a car peaks into the frame of a photograph shot from a gravel road, overlooking a yawning valley.

A person with a camera takes a photo of themselves in the mirror of a public restroom.

Poem

On the surface,

I see your winding,

aimless streets,

your elegant style,

but I rediscover now

(or just now find)

that you dig deep

beneath the earth,

wrapped within

geologic time

(I remember once, as a child,

you welcomed me inside—

I saw your maroon, sparkling

mind in awe, but could not touch)

At a roadside lookout, people lean over the railing, beyond which a foggy expanse stretches.

Photograph of a car, its door open, parked in a parking lot.

Poem

Dull Chattanooga noon

with 36 hours, gone—

Standing this far away,

with vision obscured in

smoke, and fog,

I wonder again

if your strange,

wet heart truly

rushes,

like mine

An image of a sign in a field of grass that reads "Buffalo Bill's Grave."

Image of a man wearing a ball cap leaning against the railing of a lookout.

Poem

I speak too much

sometimes—

your soft spine,

my scarred,

disjointed mind.