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"In 400 words, create your ideal place."
One hundred miles from any center of population in any direction stands the white throat of a dead volcano. Like a host of spears of granite it threatens the cobalt Great Basin sky; it points rudely at heaven. At the ends of very hot summer afternoons its obnoxious silence can finally break the temper of the dome of sky, which answers back with shouting thunder and zigzag lightning. Their anger furiously spent, these two lapse back into ancient thoughts by dusk. Cleansed by horizontal rain, the white granite mountain smiles into the sunset; winking with mica it throws its long shadows over its shoulders like a woman’s hair in the wind. Little clear rainwater pools around and between and inside the rock maze grow cold. In some live tiny rare desert fish; beside some grow small prickly pears and yuccas, barging through the granite, splitting it and wearing it down by the season as they drink. When the rock is too much for the cacti and yuccas to persuade, the wind and ice will help them. The rock will become friends with the white sand of the basin floor. They will visit each other in their houses whenever a storm comes, until one day they agree on everything. The mother of sand is sagebrush and its father is juniper. For the love of its mother and father it stays in this quiet valley.
The fish in the desert pools make very little sound, sometimes a soft “lup” as they take a gnat from the surface of the water and descend again to eat. Most of the other sounds in this white-throated mountain are solemn and careful, as well. The large raindrops that come when a storm ebbs at the end of the day say “pat, pat” to the rock as they strike. Earlier in the day, gathering bees mumbled to themselves about pollen; Mormon crickets tried to make up songs about everything, their ideas wandered away, they thought about a new song. They go on like that all day, all summer, all fall. Sometimes a badger digs after a ground squirrel. Sometimes in the distant night coyotes laugh and whistle, if they’re hunting in this valley. The next day, riding thermals, an eagle cries “piii-pii-pi.” Later the heat will brew another thunderstorm, driving the scent of sage before it, and everyone will be still, watching the lightning fight the mountain.
One hundred miles from any center of population in any direction stands the white throat of a dead volcano. Like a host of spears of granite it threatens the cobalt Great Basin sky; it points rudely at heaven. At the ends of very hot summer afternoons its obnoxious silence can finally break the temper of the dome of sky, which answers back with shouting thunder and zigzag lightning. Their anger furiously spent, these two lapse back into ancient thoughts by dusk. Cleansed by horizontal rain, the white granite mountain smiles into the sunset; winking with mica it throws its long shadows over its shoulders like a woman’s hair in the wind. Little clear rainwater pools around and between and inside the rock maze grow cold. In some live tiny rare desert fish; beside some grow small prickly pears and yuccas, barging through the granite, splitting it and wearing it down by the season as they drink. When the rock is too much for the cacti and yuccas to persuade, the wind and ice will help them. The rock will become friends with the white sand of the basin floor. They will visit each other in their houses whenever a storm comes, until one day they agree on everything. The mother of sand is sagebrush and its father is juniper. For the love of its mother and father it stays in this quiet valley.
The fish in the desert pools make very little sound, sometimes a soft “lup” as they take a gnat from the surface of the water and descend again to eat. Most of the other sounds in this white-throated mountain are solemn and careful, as well. The large raindrops that come when a storm ebbs at the end of the day say “pat, pat” to the rock as they strike. Earlier in the day, gathering bees mumbled to themselves about pollen; Mormon crickets tried to make up songs about everything, their ideas wandered away, they thought about a new song. They go on like that all day, all summer, all fall. Sometimes a badger digs after a ground squirrel. Sometimes in the distant night coyotes laugh and whistle, if they’re hunting in this valley. The next day, riding thermals, an eagle cries “piii-pii-pi.” Later the heat will brew another thunderstorm, driving the scent of sage before it, and everyone will be still, watching the lightning fight the mountain.