Kanimbla Valley

From our verandah, you can see a tiny scrap of the Kanimbla valley with a postage stamp sized piece of escarpment that blazes in late afternoon light. I often forget it’s there, that part of the valley, stretching around behind us and mostly hidden by the mountain’s skirts. But if I walk up the mountain a little way and take the track that swings to the southeast, it rolls itself out below me.

Even then it’s only partly glimpsed. From that height, I look down through dense bush, and my view shows tantalizing flashes, like a half-dressed figure. It’s alluring, sensual, mysterious. I want to touch it, to stroke it, to run my hand across its pleats and folds, much as I suspect a glacier once did.

It is a landscape I would choose to make; one I choose to inhabit. All shadows and light. It brings to mind a time I walked a labyrinth on a day of contemplation and renewal. I was given a handful of clay to mould as I walked, and to express some prayer or hope or need. And as my feet trod out those steps, my hands felt for the shape the clay desired. What emerged was a thing of grooves and folds, half hidden from itself. Organic, moving, alive. If it could transform itself into a piece of ground, it would be this valley.

This valley that is held in the cupped palm of the mountains like a living thing. I can almost feel its breath, see the curves and hollows rise and fall in slow rhythm. As though it is simply waiting, curled inside that great hand, ready to purr and roll and arch. Muscles outlined beneath green fur.