Country and City 77 



just been created, and created for me. I give 

 myself over to the blue vault of the sky; or 

 if it rain, to first-hand relationship with the 

 elements, for can I not touch the drops that 

 fall from some mysterious height ? I am con- 

 scious of a quick smell of the soil, something 

 like the smell of the sea. I hear the call of a 

 bird or a faint rush of wind, or catch a shadow 

 that passes and is gone. There is a sudden 

 sensation of green things tumbled over the 

 ground. I feel that they are living, growing, 

 aspiring, sensitive. 



Then the details begin to grow up out of 

 the area, every detail perfect in its way, every 

 one individual, yet all harmonious. The late 

 rain compacted the earth; but here are little 

 grooves and cuts made by tiny rills that ran 

 down the furrows and around the stems of 

 the plants, coalescing and growing as they 

 ran, digging gorges between mountainous clods, 

 spreading into islanded lakelets, depositing 

 deltas, and then plunging headlong toward 

 some far-off sea, a panorama that needs only 

 to be magnified to make those systems of 



