Wall Mountain
by Francis Sheppard, 2000
A name the nineteenth century settlers gave,
Those immigrants, whose agricultural past
Of flock and gather deprecated words.
Around, Mount Usborne, Harriet and Kent
Commit to British memory the names
Of potentates of Empire and their ships
Never a thought for what the peaks resembled.
Herders though, whose fellowship was silence
Marked out the land with simple metaphor:
Two Sisters, Wineglass Ridge, the Onion.
Knowing the ground, the peat-bank, bog and ditch
The drovers marked their way through plain and outcrop
Piling up rocks against the sky. Visible for miles
The headed cairns they'd greet as Standing Men
Their gaunt position struck against the hillside.
Colossal the slab they levered above Estancia
Funnelling the whole plain's sheep en route for Fitzroy,
Portal to vague path skirting the rubble-flow
The summit's slant grey boulders - Smoko -
Ahead of the downslopes, the jetty, the sea.
San Carlos cites Spain's piety
Port Louis, heavenly might of France.
No ancient priesthood deified these peaks
Mythology scattering down like stone-runs.
So to Wall Mountain. Crumbled grey bulwark
Rising above the main airport highway
Pierced by the North Camp Road. A rearward glance
Of an earlier century, riding towards sun
Half-sees a diadem, jewels grey-glowing.
Frank Sheppard taught English at the
Falkland Islands
Community School from January 1999 to December 2000
