Zanskar

Prodigious and outstanding

wide-ranging and far flung

Breathtaking and overwhelming

just wandering among

the mountain paths

Exceptionally, beautiful out here

panoramic skies of blue

unrestricted and so clear

Zanskar Kaargill District

Ladakh in India where

There are  isolated  villages

and where people are aware

the altitude is very high

fields of Barley sway

in the stiff winds blowing

in the true light of the day

an ethnologist about to start

a three months study here

Gestures  words and phrases

Learning it is clear

this Himalayan Region

Where life is in

the  raw

4 generations of sharing

Great  rocky scapes and more

apparently more women live here

and we see

farming and grass cutting

and we vitally

face vast

long mountain passes

overly on view

the light up here exceptional

the extremes are blatant too

weather beaten faces

Complexions clear and tanned

an eminence apparent

Strong  of hand and eye

trecking through the various paths

all very very high

13000 feet or more

where Barley grasses grow

too high for much else  it seems

for god types to bestow

the slopes are rugged orange

the sky a vast display

of blueness with some far off clouds

simple folk whose way

is dealing with their children

This is  what they do

a kid brought in a basket

thats what is asked of  you

housekeeping and preparing

the Barley stew of old

no vegetables grow at this height

so on Barley they are sold

this  a land of women folk

Weaving  grasses they

Prepared for the simplicity

an assembly each day

The integrity of  Nature

the wholeness one can feel

Totality of  purpose

Just everything is  real

artistic composition

an authorship as well

a literary expansion

its like a magic spell

such harmony and quietness

Prequels to the  fore

a great spirit of vastness

beyond everyones door

the simplicity of cooking  pots

in perpetuity

of women’s work

done day and  night

And always purposefully.