It turns out that liturgy is what the hills are saying –
what people have failed to pray the hills are praying.

Hector, whose shoulders in a newly fashioned
stole of snow are draped, faces Rangituhi,

the latter’s shadow feeding on the former’s
lasting light, like standard font and bold.

Between lie the valleys along which humans
commute, their phones and radios tuned

to all the noises held in the après-southerly’s
crystal air, and the rivers and streams which bear

the sluiced shards of careless shoppers’ surplus
plastics, and countless discards besides.

The hills hold all of this. All points around
about gaze on Hector’s cross, and bow.