Pamir

The Crushed Mountains

An icy wind whips my face. The mountains of the Pamir stand all around me covered by a thin layer of frost and the mist that shared their bed for the night dissolves like a dream. Its compact mass swells, slims down, then gets pierced through and through, giving way to a uniform cobalt sky. We are in the middle of August, yet it seems that Winter has never really left the Pamir highlands. Coarse, scattered, rarely higher than a rock, vegetation, in a desperate attempt to survive, sucks the smallest drops of summer dew available before they are crushed again by Its snowy drape.

The lunatic climate has sculpted lunar landscapes. Sharp peaks tearing the sky apart stand alongside turquoise lakes edged by crystallized salt. Winter holds its kingdom with an iron hand but It is not alone in claiming this land. Sun stands firm and sometimes doubles intensity against this tyrannical hold, consuming both the living and the inanimate. The balance of the seasons on the Roof of the World is a utopia; temperance and softness, distant chimeras. Only Mist has the ability to appease their ardor, but only for a short moment. The Mountain suffers the assaults of its contenders and loses a little more of its superb in a seemingly eternal torment. Obliterated by the elements Her peaks crumble. The air, saturated with dust, will swell the ranks of deserts, scavengers of a doomed conflict. Nothing will be left of the Mountain but the seeds of a new cycle, scattered by winds in every direction.