Ladders Poem by Raynette Eitel

In Taos, pueblos are striped with ladders
leading to blue doors like pieces of sky.

Inside, braves wrapped in blankets
burrow close to a fire, shivering

as they dream of nimble ghosts
who scramble high and higher in moonlight.

They picture ladders made of rainbows
reaching across a vault of blue.

They mutter in dream talk to spirits
of the long dead who traverse colors.

Cliff dwellers celebrated ladders
clinging to the side of mountains

where ancient apartments housed
the tribes. Some days cold pale clouds

shrouded the crest in mystery.
One might suppose God himself

placed Jacob’s old ladder there
just to test their bravery.

When ancient ones could not scale rungs
at long last, they stayed on top,

close to heaven, awaiting the last step
no mortal can see until

he takes God’s own hand and leaps
like a young man to his reward in the sky.