Invisible Mountains Carry the Weight of Forgotten Elephants

They rise like memory’s mist,
these transparent peaks
bearing phantom herds
across the sky’s empty page.

Ghost-gray trunks trumpet
through layers of nothing,
while crystalline slopes
bend beneath the pressure
of footprints no one can see.

The mountains learned transparency
from studying dreams,
learned to hold without having,
to be without being seen —
perfect guardians for pachyderms
that history misplaced.

Each invisible crevasse
cradles an elephant’s sigh,
preserved in the amber
of collective amnesia,
while unseen glaciers
polish ancient tusks
made of morning fog
and last night’s wishes.

The weight is real:
tons of remembered muscle,
centuries of wisdom
wrapped in wrinkled skin
that never was —
all balanced on summits
that refuse to cast shadows.

Between air and absence,
these diaphanous ridges
flex their granite patience,
whispering lullabies
to translucent calves
who play hide-and-seek
with their own existence.

Watch closely:
the space between clouds
might be an ear flapping,
that shimmer of heat
could be a trunk raised
in silent salute
to possibilities
that never came to pass.

The invisible mountains
stand sentinel,
their vacant slopes
more solid than stone
in their devotion
to carrying what we forgot
to remember.

And sometimes,
in the corner of dawn,
you might catch them
adjusting their burden
of vanished giants,
making room for one more
forgotten dream
on their transparent shoulders.