Who is the maker of these mighty hills;
what hands could draw these from the deep?
Are they the battle scars of contesting wills
—a shield shattered ‘gainst a granite keep?
On the ridge there lurks a murder of crows
scavenging the flesh from Nike‘s broken wings.
These chasms, are they forged by hammer blows
—the clashings of Titans and Totem Kings?
Or was it some plowmen without purpose or mind?
The pass, the valleys, and the furrows cut by
glacial giants, omnipotent and blind,
who offer to our longings no reply.
Whose crown is so brutal, pure, and white as bone;
who reigns from this cold throne of snow and stone?
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| The Olympic Mountains in Washington State |