Frontiers
Photos and poems by Craig Rock unless noted.
Zion National Park, Utah
Green Valley, AZ
Tonasket WA
Molson WA
Frontier
unmarked lands scorched by the gods
forests with no trails, no one before you
to show easy ways, backtracking
this way! no, that way!
again and again backtracking
coming across
skeletons of past lives
that ended so quickly
with wrong turns.
nights falling
on open fires fed by a million stars
sketching tomorrow's paths
through nowhere in a long dream
to some place called home.
And one morning
after hopeless cold you wake up
and you are there!
and you've been there
for a long time.
Free Moving Legs
Out West
Free moving legs
of the soul,
pumping air into the heart
of time,
making space to travel
from narrow roads
of the absurd and madness
to open fields of freedom
with dignity for all
in body and mind
a new beginning
out West.
Above photos: Posters designed by Canadian railroads to attract settlers to the Canadian West.
"Living next to you is in some ways like sleeping with an elephant, no matter how friendly and even tempered is the beast, one is affected by every twitch and grunt." Prime Minister Elliot Trudeau on Canada bordering the United States, 1969.
Copyright Craig Rock, all photos except posters. Top photos: Southern Utah (2), Tonasket WA, Molson WA.