WATER BORDERS 



lipped cup, and the guides of that region 

 love to tell of the packs and pack animals 

 it has swallowed up. 



But the lakes of Oppapago are perhaps 

 not so deep, less green than gray, and better 

 befriended. The ousel haunts them, while 

 still hang about their coasts the thin under- 

 cut drifts that never quite leave the high 

 altitudes. In and out of the bluish ice 

 caves he flits and sings, and his singing 

 heard from above is sweet and uncanny 

 like the Nixie's chord. One finds butter- 

 flies, too, about these high, sharp regions 

 which might be called desolate, but will not 

 by me who love them. This is above tim- 

 ber-line but not too high for comforting by 

 succulent small herbs and golden tufted 

 grass. A granite mountain does not 

 crumble with alacrity, but once resolved to 

 soil makes the best of it. Every handful 

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