Atop Kings Peak

King’s Peak rises 13,528 feet in the Uinta Range and is named after Clarence King, first director of the U.S. Geological Survey. Image by by William S. Sutton
Once on the summit
of King’s Peak, highest
in Utah, we notice
a scarcity of flowers
but a richness in diversity
of rocks from granites
to shales to quartzites
and sandstones, all of
reddish-brown hue.
As pikas squeak in
high pitch, we gaze
at all the surrounding
mountains of Gilbert,
Emmons and Red Knob,
but distant Tokewanna
Peak, with its crest of
snow, catches my eye for
more than a moment or two.