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John Day Fossil Beds National Monument, Oregon - Painted Hills Unit


I walked into a valley of time.
pages of time written by volcanoes
a table of contents set down so long ago

I would have thought it was forever



ice, rain, sun and air ā€“ like a plague of mice
nibble at the pages
precious stories preserved in earth
washed away forever



heirs to life
we who still exist
winding through an intricate unbroken plot
always at the right place at the right time with the right skills


a churning molten core
birth pains
a hundred miles westward
earth breathes, breathes - ash into the sky
time and again
Technicolor vomit
or the afterbirth of a motherā€™s creation




Earth opens herself
we glimpse long hidden words
there is revelation here



the ancient sun
peers over a hill
illuminates the past
ā€œI remember youā€, it says
ā€œwhen you were youngerā€
ā€œyou look different nowā€




As for man, his days are like grass:
He flourishes like a flower of the field;
For the wind passes over it, and it is gone,
And its place knows it no more.*

*Psalms 103: 15-16




standing on a cusp of time
forwards and backwards bending out of sight
making as much sense as
a calendar to a mayfly




a graphic message in a bottle




cast adrift on the green waves of a continent



pretty good painting
for a painter with no eyes




waves lined up to the horizon
arrive at the shore endlessly
an essential pattern




Apply, lather, rinse, repeat




quick look close




too late...it's gone



For detailed information about the Painted Hills, visit the John Day Fossil Beds National Monument web site: http://www.nps.gov/joda

ADDENDUM:

I followed the URL (that Cynthia posted) to June Underwoodā€™s gallery of Recent Work and had a wonderful experience seeing the Painted Hills through completely different eyes - acknowledging sights I missed or overlooked and adopting metaphors I never would have made. Mrs. Underwoodā€™s hills are crazy-colored animated landscapes rendered with a refreshing childlike exuberance and originality that makes the mechanical act of photography look as creative as a copy machine. Perhaps it would be better to hear the artistā€™s own words, ā€œ. ā€¦the Painted Hills seem to me to be great primeval creatures, stretching and reaching out and rolling under and along the earth's surface. They are spectacular in part because we don't usually come into contact with the actual contours of the earth's flesh -- usually the "flesh" is covered with soil and grass and trees and roads and culverts and fences. To return to that primeval vision, earth in all its rawness, without clothes, without cover, is astonishing.ā€

See June's work in progress at: http://www.juneunderwood.com/workinprogress.php

See June's recent work at: http://www.juneunderwood.com/gallery-recent.php

Or, to feel the pulse of June's S.E. Portland neighborhood, visit http://southeastmain.typepad.com/southeastmain/ and be sure to check out the pictures of the John Day fossil Beds National monument scattered in the September archive.

Comments

  1. A woman I know from Portland did an artist-in-residence program there recently. Her work that came out of that place is amazing.

    Thanks for the poetry and images. It's another place I will need to venture.

    ReplyDelete
  2. June Underwood is the artist. I am enthralled by her work:

    http://www.juneunderwood.com/gallery-recent.php

    Make sure you also click on "Work in Progress" at the top of the page.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Scott,

    These are amazing photos. As you know, I am now working from photos of various of the Fossil Beds features, but I've neither seen nor taken anything like you have here. They are spectacular.

    I will be writing you personally in a bit, but I needed to make an immediate comment about your photography.

    ReplyDelete

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