Deep underground I pose for a self portrait. My camera sits on its tripod some feet away and my lights are carefully arranged to cast the right shadows to capture the ambience of the underworld. The camera clicks and the four second exposure begins. Without warning there is a flurry of movement from farther up the tunnel. I try not to look to avoid blurring the picture.

Then come the steady beating of footsteps on wet cement. The photo now forgotten I dash first for my lights and then the camera throwing everything haphazardly into my bag. Dashing off down the tunnel I too have given away my presence and the chase now echoes far into the darkness.

Too far from any outflows to escape the underground completely I am determined to hide from my pursuer. Sprinting down a side tunnel I have not explored before, my skull cracks against the ceiling. Bright lights explode in my eyes and I feel myself falling backwards my grip loosened on the heavy maglight.

Slowly I wake up. The darkness is complete. Lost and confused, I try to remember where I am. My thoughts feel thick and muddy like the foul water creeping around me. Reaching out with heavy arms I feel slick concrete under numbed fingers. As my senses return the effluvium seeps, sweet at first, into my brain, as claustrophobic as the walls, forcing themselves on me.

Carefully I shift into a crouch and begin to crawl down the tunnel that stretches how far I cannot tell. Struggling against the thick flow my knees sink into the soft substrate, tightly curled fingers sift through chunks of the clammy gelatin.

In another life I was so confident, so self-assured. Others questioned my uncompromising attitude and determinations. Fleeting memories of those days pass before me like ghosts. I press on through this hell; perhaps here lies the path to salvation…

-2012-
sleepwalking
new chapter

-2011-
like sedona?
torn in two
blink
bridge to nowhere
door
hitting the wall
elusive 2
elusive 1
ascenders
voyage
hole
icarus

-2010-
revisited 2
revisited 1
which way?
the pit
treasure
narrow
snowfall
chute
false floor
monolith
crack
freeze
slice
bunker
beckon
treasure
resolution

-2009-
goodbyes
undercurrents
casting the bones
mountain thief
the deer hunter
strange temple
sanctuary
burial pt. 3
burial pt. 2
burial pt. 1
scarlet fever
rebirth from hell
forsaken
the lower depths
underground lake
stretch sewer
crypt
still waters
shadow movements
meager rations
sw pt.8: geothermal + ending
sw pt.7: lost gold mines
sw pt.6: big tube caves
sw pt.5: gold!
sw pt.4: el calderon caves
sw pt.3: redondo
sw pt.2: ghosts
southwest adventure pt.1
the river
dark salvation
reflections
dreams
the underdark
night odyssey
beginnings