Great Western Woodlands | image © Jennie Stock | http://JennieStock.com

What Is Great

The largest temperate woodland
expanse still intact on earth;
a continuous band about the size

of England; a rich tapestry of mallee,
shrublands, and woodlands extends
across a wide ancient landscape —

flat valleys and variegated ridges
connecting to inland deserts;
refuge for unique, threatened species

found nowhere else on earth;
Aboriginal presence for 22,000 years;
human survival — even prosperity —

in a broad landscape challenging most
resourceful, indigenous ways of life;
tens of thousands of years —

tales of discovery by early explorers,
colossal Kalgoorlie gold rushes, the stuff
of modern and ancient mythologies —

the Great Western Woodlands holds
it all in its natural, expansive embrace
— the mythic Australian wilderness.

. . . . .

Poet: Susan Powers Bourne
Source: NatureMap
Process: White out, pick and mix