El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1920-06-22
The Palisades

IT is fine walking up the Palisades,
If you have the breath, and take
your time. and have stout shoes on
and if it rained the night before.
The Palisades are rocky walls that
shut in a canyon that rambles up
Mount Franklin on the west side
You can climb up the mesa from
the high school There you take
breath If you can find Il. and admire
the view. Wonderful how you love
FL Paso when you look down on il
, from the mesa rim II Is like when
your daughter goes off 70 boarding
school or your son TO college and you
stop scolding and just love them.
Fl Paso's faults don't show at all
from the mesa, one just loves the
city, the river, and the circllng noun
tains.
Then you slip along past the little
Mexican church, only you cannot go
by. you must stop. such clean, tidy
with a bright colored print, Of the
Madonna enthroned with the child,
where in richer churches IS stained
glass The window Is back Of this
print and leaks light all around It in
a halo that brightens the high place.
The glory IS always there, even in
the least Of these pictures. This one
is framed with blue paper lilies stand
ing straight and tall on either side.
Bunches Of the same flowers are In
vases at either end OF the altar The
little bell is on the floor at the foot
A tiny confessional with a bit OF
fluttering curtain between the sinner
lrnee1ing on his steps and the priest
represents the cell Of the good father
and his separation from the world
Little fat children tumble about the
steps with flowers in their brown
EFrH n q
the church and take up out OF doors
The trail falls a bit from the mesa
and then winds its way and decreases
from a big road 70 a little road TO a
big path TO a little path 70 a big trail
to a little trail 10 a thread.
But the Wrens follow us all the
way, and big sennas lift yellow heads
along the path. Little leaved, bristly
sumachs are studded and bossed with
rose and coral. the homes Of some
little insects whose mother stung
this bush and all the other little
leaved bushes we have seen this
spring. and left imbedded in the bud
axis some life that IL was her des-
tiny to pass along, but in passing Il
along she borrowed the rich reds OF
the sumach or else the poor sumachs
are fooled into giving their rich
color 10 this parasite
The crusts and branches that grow
where buds should be, where the
mother insect stung, look like thick
punches OF flower buds. took one
such bunch home and put II in water
thinking the buds would flower but
they did not for they were bugs.
Later I discovered on the plant the
tiny scarlet fruits OF a few little
dried white flowers. the legitimate
offspring Of this sumach-
There are Apache plume like little
white roses and tiny coral stemmed
spurEes flat like green and red lace
on the Stones We found porOphyllum
standing high and black Swallowed,
and hibiscus pretty as purple tulips
blooming one by one The pennyroyal
had bloomed and is seeding every soft
place in the high rocks
The opopOnaX or fragrant acacia
huisache, they call Il in san Antonio,
blooms yellow fuzzy balls Of bloom
heavily sweet. In France they make
perfume out Of opoponax. 1t IS a
standard smell. This canyon is
scented with II and yellowed with It,
and giant locusts swing on the slen-
der straight branches and sing their
love songs up and down the scale, and
when they do not sing, they turn
the soft fragrant powdery yellow
balls in their horrid feelers and bury
their beady heads uD TO their cool
beady eyes IN the little soft balls and
after feasting a moment on perfume
and pollen they sing again, sing Tor
a mate.
We meet a pair OF horned toads out
for a walk. Mister and Missus evil
IDENTIFY. She slenderer and with
green throat and younger, he old,
warty, horny. and all in sand color
But they would not separate. We
scared them but they scared to-
gether.
A worm. big brown thing as big as
a young snake and horrid hard shelled
looking and horrid vicious when at
tackled with a flower stem. crossed
our path and we later met a big lizard
green as grass with a fine black and
white striped collar
The mountain IS full OF folk who
come out after a rain. The Wrens
never leave one. lizards and horned
toads cross our path so that at times
we need a traffic COP. E NICE. S.