The pristine colors of brush and grass swirl together like paint on an artist's hand after a day's work.

Deep green cedars sprout, like rocks out of the sea, from the pastel yellow and purple tide of aging grass.

The smattering of crimson prickly pear tuna stand in plucky defiance to the endless expanse of sky, 

Dotted only by specks of clouds moving across the blue fields like herds of sluggish sheep.

Each component so starkly different, and yet, the same, merges to create a stage more beautiful than the theaters of Rome,

On which millions of tiny actors live out thousands of different plays.

The young coyote, striking out on his own, anxious of fending for himself and of forging his own pack;

The sun-dried cottonwood, standing aloof as a sentry while straining desperately for a cool sip of water to alleviate the summer heat.

The doe searching frantically for her fawn who has gone down a coyote's gullet.

The insignificant field mouse, traveling across unseen highways to reach bustling metropolises that will never know the face of a map, and traversing

Cruel no-man's lands to return home before the sun lays bare his secret roads.

Each one enacts dramas of their own, of their kind, and of their land known only to the unfeeling sun and spectral moon.

Each actor, both pivotal and insignificant at once, forms a cell of the beating, throbbing, quivering heart that is the pasture.