Consider the mountain. No, consider the man.
It’s bad form to sell uphill.
So start with Palouse and build up to buttes,
sell them in spring when the grass is lush
and wildflowers run riot among the foothills.
Let the rivers tell their simple story,
running full from snowmelt,
let the personable maples
draped in moss talk,
in fact
shut up.
Everything here was shaped
by giants older and bigger
than we can comprehend.
Consider the glacier:
the slowness
of its movement,
the powerful crush
of tectonic plates to raise
a mountain range,
the long copy landscape
of the Northern Cascades.
Listen, and then consider
the mountain
and then consider the man,
so small and fragile
and very much alive.
OPTIONAL POETRY 
I love the sense of long stretches of time in this poem.
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Thank you! As with most poems from prompt exercises I’m not really sure about it, but think the aspect of time and agelessness would be something to explore if I come back to it.
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Nice the way you present time, and size. I love the pivot: “in fact / shut up.” I grew up in the Palouse, not so long ago as the glaciers, but long ago enough that to go back home would be to travel in time as well as space. I hope you do come back to this one.
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Thank you! I am just starting to fall in love with the Palouse, it’s so iconic and frankly just a fun word to say 🙂
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