Subtle Pallet [November 2009]

I wish
I could show you
this land
through my eyes.

They say
there is too little green
there is too much brown
in Colorado.

I remember lush Ohio
wet, wet greens
straight out of Crayola 48:
spring green
bright fluorescent lawns
tall kindergarten-bush trees
manicured
cultivated
tamed.

Here
the pallet is less vibrant
more subtle:
sage green
pine green
pale lichen green
but green nonetheless.

The brown is not mere brown
but traildust, cliff-red,
sagebrush,
a windswept sea of
tawny, sunkissed, russet
goldenrod grasses
brightening to softest jade
where a stream trickles
off the mountains.

This is not a place
of kaleidoscope colors.
It is a wild, rugged land
of rich textures:
white-fuzzed succulents
clinging to mottled rock
the bumps of prairie dog watchtowers
punctuated by dust-tan fur
standing sentinel.

I know a place in the prairie
where a stunted tree spreads out
over a bare outcropping
of rock, its roots
stubbornly seeking sustenance
above the ground.
It looks like a classic scene
from Biblical tales
lonely tree in the wind
against an impossibly blue sky
above a sea of gold and green:
foam-tipped waves of grass
in the valley below.