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The Narrows

A poem printed on a monochrome surface. The background image depicts a narrow canyon, through which a river flows. The rocky cliffs come closer together as they rise upwards. A PDF of the full poem can also be read on Zion National Park's website, on the Artist-in-Residence Donated Artwork page.

Jason Gray, June 2023 Poem Transcription: Nature is making and Unmaking itself at once The waving sandstone, curved Like a body Rounded belly, Pectoral slab, the joint Of a knee jutting out From the rumpled sheet of water This is a living sculpture The Virgin River chisels Seventy-six feet down Every mile Splitting Thousand foot walls of stone For two million years Humankind has only seen An inch of deepening Throughout our history The wrens flit from wall To wall The maidenhairs In every crack deep green And damp The light starts To expand inside the slot Canyon as the earth turns Toward the sun Thirty degrees Of rotation and forty-eight Degrees of temperature And eighty cubic feet per second The rate of flow has grown Against you, your thighs, your groin, Breaththieving cold Hand hooked Around a wooden stick A trek into creation Should come with difficulty This was a trail you thought A thing to accomplish But now An altar A place for joining A place for offering You are a part of this Process You reached The high sunlight that falls Straight into the canyon The water like lit glass As if it could have ever ended

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NPS Photo / Jason Gray

Public domain:Full Granting Rights

Image

Zion National Park, Code: ZION

Zion National Park, Utah
Latitude: 37.2794418334961, Longitude: -113.045700073242

NPS.gov Collection

June 2023

07/18/2025

Public Can View

Friday, September 26, 2025 4:28:59 PM

Friday, September 26, 2025 4:35:34 PM

The Narrows.JPG

Canon Canon, Canon EOS 6D

1/50 sec at f / 4

55 mm

ISO 1250

Friday, July 18, 2025 12:38:01 PM

jpg

1.1 MB

Scenic