Colorado River South of Hoover Dam Panorama — Images by kenne
The Rocks
of these mountains
are no match against
the mighty river.
Weary of its motion
they open to
potent penetration.
— kenne
Colorado River Panorama 1 comment
First 100 Degree Day In Tucson May 30th 2 comments
Patio Sun Screen — Image by kenne
Our patio is where we can sit and watch the sunset. But when the temperatures start going over 100 degrees, it’s time for the patio sun screen. Through the screen we can watch the sunset with the shadows of the sago palm and olive tree on the screen — beautiful day in the desert!
We almost made it through May without hitting triple digits.
kenne
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The Cliffs Of Zion Canyon Panorama 7 comments
“The Cliffs of Zion Canyon” — Panorama by kenne
Zion Canyon cliffs
Towers of sandstone forming
Majestic wonders.
— kenne
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The Real Jurassic Park Leave a comment
Zion National Park Towering Cliffs — Image by kenne
The Real Jurassic Park
can be found in the
deposition and preservation
of Navajo Sandstone. Dating
back to the Early Jurassic
situated on one continent
was a vast sand sea. Extreme
winds created towering dunes
of pure quartz sand
dwarfing modern Sahara. Migrating
avalanches over one another
laminating the dune surface
thus becoming more stable.
Changing over time
by climatic cycles
locking stories of time into
Navajo Sandstone and
forming the towering
Zion National Park cliffs.
— kenne
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Granite Angles 4 comments
“Granite Angles” Zion National Park (May 20, 2015) — Image by kenne
The Granite Angles
of elevation and depression
looking up from my window
adorned by trees. A bird’s
song lost in its echo’s
I cannot scale. Lines of age
sketch your face. Tall trees
strike me as bonsais
taking root in your
weathered surface. Smooth
now, your peaks
penetrate the sky
and your cloud halo.
Your shadows dissolve
in a sigh of relief
bringing peace
to earth’s soul.
— kenne
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Beauty In The Park Leave a comment
Wildflower in Zion National Park (May 20, 2015) — Image by kenne
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The Mohave Desert Joshua Tree Leave a comment
Joshua Tree Painting — Images by kenne
There’s a section of Highway 93
between Wikieup to Wickenburg —
Joshua Forest Scenic Road.
California has its National Park,
Arizona has its Scenic Road.
This narrow,
hilly two-lane road
is part of our route
to Las Vegas
and Zion National Park
from Tucson.
It’s not easy to stop to take
snapshots of these majestic yuccas —
no shoulders and only an occasional
ranch road that sneaks-up on you
while being pushed by speeding drivers
trying to pass you.
On a recent drive
we were able to pull-off
to the fence-line
where others had done the same
leaving behind trashed beer cans —
what a paradox.
The splendor of the Joshua tree
is as unique and identifiable to the
Mohave Desert
as the majestic saguaro cactus
is to the
Sonoran Desert.
— kenne
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Shared Gaze Of Curiosity 1 comment
Deer in Zion National Park Near the Zion Human History Museum — Image by kenne
Shared Gaze of Curiosity
Generations of deer
have lived with
generations of humans
in the canyons we call Zion.
No longer prey for humans
the deers of Zion graze
near where natural predators
will not venture.
Many animals seem
to understand the show
providing for an occasional
shared gaze of curiosity.
— kenne
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Zion National Park Majestic View Panorama Leave a comment
Zion National Park Panorama Taken From Our Balcony at Majestic View Lodge (5/20/15) — Image by kenne
I still remember those majestic views
out by the balcony railing
in the shadow of the late afternoon sun
as I captured several moments
before darkness,
waiting for the majestic view
to become an early evening glow
when the world becomes mine.
— kenne
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Out On A Limb, Beware Of The Saw Leave a comment
“Out on a Limb” — Image by kenne
live out on a limb
where the best nectar is found
away from the norm.
my teacher told me
flowers and blossoms will die
beware of the saw.
— kenne
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Escaping From The Vegas Strip 1 comment
Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area Outside Las Vegas, Nevada — Images by kenne
(Click on any of the images to see larger view in a slideshow format.)
I came to the canyon seeking an escape
from the manmade strip of bright lights.
Decade old Scenic wildfire still fenced-off.
Vegas influenced exhibits at the visitors
center providing impressive vistas of
the northern Mojave Desert.
Hiking the rocks and desert floor
ending the day on the 13 mile Scenic Drive.
Collecting my winning in nature’s house
the freeway takes me back
to where the house rules,
I lose.
— kenne
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Quiet Reflection, Memorial Day, 2015 1 comment
Calvin Owens, known for two periods of work as bandleader for blues legend B.B. King, A.J. Murphy who played with 60’s R&B band Archie Bell and the Drells and A.J.s wife Francine. Image by kenne
On Memorial Day I can’t help but think of our dear friends A.J and Francine Murphy and the image that appeared in the Houston Chronicle “Remembering The Fallen” on Memorial Day, 2009. Francine is probably in “quiet reflection” at the US Houston National Cemetery today.
kenne
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Counting from One to a Million, Whitman and the Civil War Dead 2 comments
Ed Folsom presenting “Counting from One to a Million, Whitman and the Civil War Dead” — Image by kenne
For the 24th year the Writers in Performance series at Lone Star College – Montgomery celebrated the birthday of Walt Whitman. For the last several years the celebrations has been in two parts, one a lecture on campus in the afternoon, the second part an evening gathering of poets at a local pub or cafe.
This year’s lecture featured Dr. Ed Folsom recognizing the sesquicentennial of the publication of Dram Taps, most of which Whitman wrote while serving as a hospital volunteer tending wounded and dying soldiers. Whitman felt that a poet’s voice was needed to document the war and help make sense of such a travesty.
This year’s Birthday Celebration for Walt Whitman took place May 7th, which I thought would be appropriate to delay posting till this Memorial Day, 2015. (Post Note) — The holiday originally was called Decoration Day and was a day of remembrance for Union soldiers who died in the American Civil War.
kenne
The Gathering of Poets at Dosey Doe Music Cafe, Conroe Texas — Images by kenne
The following passage from Dram Taps includes the longest sentence ever written by Whitman.
The Million Dead, Too, Summ’d Up — The Unknown (from Memoranda During the War)
THE DEAD in this war—there they lie, strewing the fields and woods and valleys and battle-fields of the south—Virginia, the Peninsula—Malvern hill and Fair Oaks—the banks of the Chickahominy—the terraces of Fredericksburgh—Antietam bridge—the grisly ravines of Manassas—the bloody promenade of the Wilderness—the varieties of the strayed dead, (the estimate of the War department is 25,000 national soldiers kill’d in battle and never buried at all, 5,000 drown’d—15,000 inhumed by strangers, or on the march in haste, in hitherto unfound localities—2,000 graves cover’d by sand and mud by Mississippi freshets, 3,000 carried away by caving-in of banks, &c.,)—Gettysburgh, the West, Southwest—Vicksburgh—Chattanooga—the trenches of Petersburgh—the numberless battles, camps, hospitals everywhere—the crop reap’d by the mighty reapers, typhoid, dysentery, inflammations—and blackest and loathesomest of all, the dead and living burial-pits, the prison-pens of Andersonville, Salisbury, Belle-Isle, &c., (not Dante’s pictured hell and all its woes, its degradations, filthy torments, excell’d those prisons)—the dead, the dead, the dead—our dead—or South or North, ours all, (all, all, all, finally dear to me)—or East or West—Atlantic coast or Mississippi valley—somewhere they crawl’d to die, alone, in bushes, low gullies, or on the sides of hills—(there, in secluded spots, their skeletons, bleach’d bones, tufts of hair, buttons, fragments of clothing, are occasionally found yet)—our young men once so handsome and so joyous, taken from us—the son from the mother, the husband from the wife, the dear friend from the dear friend—the clusters of camp graves, in Georgia, the Carolinas, and in Tennessee—the single graves left in the woods or by the road-side, (hundreds, thousands, obliterated)—the corpses floated down the rivers, and caught and lodged, (dozens, scores, floated down the upper Potomac, after the cavalry engagements, the pursuit of Lee, following Gettysburgh)—some lie at the bottom of the sea—the general million, and the special cemeteries in almost all the States—the infinite dead—(the land entire saturated, perfumed with their impalpable ashes’ exhalation in Nature’s chemistry distill’d, and shall be so forever, in every future grain of wheat and ear of corn, and every flower that grows, and every breath we draw)—not only Northern dead leavening Southern soil—thousands, aye tens of thousands, of Southerners, crumble to-day in Northern earth.
And everywhere among these countless graves—everywhere in the many soldier Cemeteries of the Nation, (there are now, I believe, over seventy of them)—as at the time in the vast trenches, the depositories of slain, Northern and Southern, after the great battles—not only where the scathing trail passed those years, but radiating since in all the peaceful quarters of the land—we see, and ages yet may see, on monuments and gravestones, singly or in masses, to thousands or tens of thousands, the significant word
UNKNOWN.
(In some of the cemeteries nearly all the dead are unknown. At Salisbury, N. C., for instance, the known are only 85, while the unknown are 12,027, and 11,700 of these are buried in trenches. A national monument has been put up here, by order of Congress, to mark the spot—but what visible, material monument can ever fittingly commemorate that spot?)
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Palmers Penstemon — The Thrill Hasn’t Gone 1 comment
Palmers Penstemon — Image by kenne
The thrill hasn’t gone
it’s just move
to a new place —
I’ve found it,
have you?
Some know
where it’s at,
some don’t —
easy come
easy go.
I get all
the love
I need
down a
new path
where
the passion
remains —
but then,
who am I
telling you.
— kenne
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Red Rock Canyon Panoramas II 2 comments
Red Rock Canyon Panoramas by kenne
The scenic wildfire
Doesn’t diminish beauty
At red rock canyon.
— kenne
