Zugspitze, Germany/Austria border.

He had a mundane job in a cold place. He earned his dough by carrying tourists in a cable car from the foot to the peak of the mountain. He didn’t fancy mornings and wished for dusk to drape him as soon as possible. He looked terribly tired by day. The lines around his eyes spoke of boredom, hard work, and age. Despite all this, he had a fresh face. I think it was all because his eyes spoke a different tongue. They sang of a mad lust every time he looked down at the rough edges and textures of the mountain. The fine hair on the nape of his neck stood up. His little gold pendant shivered from the heat of his bubbling chest.

After he dropped the last set of passengers from the top of the mountain to its foot; after he’d seen their silhouettes merge with the horizon; after the last light of the sun; he would start caressing all the facets of the mountain with his bare hands. He would slowly morph into the missing river and retrace all the dry paths on her. Make gentle love to all the gullies he’d carved in her recklessly. Lick her rocks slightly, first with the tip of his tongue, and then all at once. Every night she showed him new cracks to fill and he seeped deep into her. His water, hers to keep. Her rocks, his to carry.