The North Carolina Wall, Linville Gorge
“The trail ended abruptly at the overlook.
It never failed to take her breath away:
a cliff face where the forest simply opened
and the mountain dropped away at your feet,
hundreds of feet of limestone wall
that would be a tough scramble even for a squirrel.”
Barbara Kingsolver, 1955-
“A Prodigal Summer”
View from Roan High Bluff
“People in Appalachia insisted that the mountains breathed,
and it was true: the steep hollow behind the farmhouse
took up one long, slow inhalation every morning
and let it back down through their open windows
and across the fields throughout evening –
just one full, deep breath each day.”
Barbara Kingsolver, b. 1955
“A Prodigal Summer”
“Here was one more day she almost hadn’t gotten,
the feel of this blessed sun on her face and
another look at this view of God’s green earth
laid out below them like a long green rumpled rug,
the stitched-together fields and pastures of the valley.”
Barbara Kingsolver, 1955-
“A Prodigal Summer”
