4^th of July.

I stumbled my way up and up the 3.5 mile trail to Park Butte historic Fire Lookout.

I arrive near dusk, not sure the time because I don’t have a watch or cell phone with me.

I find the place empty, how lucky to have it to myself for the night.

Up close, Mount Baker’s glaciers accordion down the southern slopes.

The sun is dipping toward the Salish Sea as I explore the nooks and crannies of the Lookout—pots, pans, water jugs, saws, axes, maps, log books from the 80s and 90s.

A few crumpled Gary Snyder poems in a tattered booklet: Patron saint of Washington Fire Lookouts.

I walk the creaky deck surrounding the Lookout.

The wind talks with long pauses between wordy gusts.

The thrushes sing, a bat flutters by eating bugs, the sky darkens.

Venus and Jupiter twinkle as a million tiny fireworks pop in the valley below.

A golden waning moon rises from the Cascade Mountains.

Sleep comes slowly, interrupted frequently by the wind rumbling and clattering through the leaky Lookout.

Smokey dawn, July 5.