Dear Readers, President Theodore Roosevelt wanted
to save this marvelous Natural Wonder for posterity! So
the Grand Canyon National Park was set up in 1919. In
1979 it was declared as World Heritage Site! With the
portion “Sun rises and sets over the Grand Canyon”, -
I have concluded this poem. Kindly take your time to read,
no need to comment in a hurry please ! Thanks, -Raj

CONCLUDING THE GRAND CANYON
STORY IN VERSE – RAJ NANDY

INTRODUCTION
Literature about great natural features include
two personal types of writing;
Description of things observed, and impressions
of what is known and seen!
The story of the Grand Canyon takes us back
to the Pre-Cambrian Age,
When violent forces were unleashed from within
the Earth, during its formative stage;
When mighty forces of erosion began to sculpture
her undulating landscapes!
Therefore, I begin with a quote about Erosion,
From the great poet Alfred Lord Tennyson; -
“The hills are shadows and they flow,
From form to form, and nothing stands.
They pass like clouds, the solid lands.
Like clouds they shape themselves and go!”

TO RECAPITULATE PART ONE:
In Part One we have seen, how movement of
earth’s tectonic plates unleashed violent forces
from within!
It formed mountains and lakes, shaping our
landscapes, which now appear so peaceful,
grand, and serene!
Over millions of years the forces of erosion in
the form of wind, rain, sun and snow,
Sculptured earth’s evolving features creating
majestic, panoramic vistas as we know!
Geologists now opine, that the Grand Canyon
was carved out by the Colorado River, -
cutting through ‘layers of Geological time’!

THE COLORADO RIVER CARVED THE CANYON:
In the state of Colorado, from the high country,
Where snow and ice lasts well beyond the dawning
days of Spring;
There the majestic peaks of the Rockies form the
perennial fountain head from which springs, -
One of the great rivers of the world the Colorado;
Which travels 1400 miles through seven States
reaching the Californian Gulf west of Mexico!
Now during prehistoric days, the pristine Colorado
had flowed almost along the same path as today!
But after the magical rise of the Colorado Plateau
some five million years ago, (Refer Part One)
It had blocked the river’s path making it flow
south-east into the Gulf of Mexico!
Few Geologists now opine, that this diverted river
had formed the pre-historic Lake Bidahochi,
Which later drained out to form the Little Colorado
River, which today we get see!
But the cut-off western portion of the river (named
Hualapai Drainage) continued to eat away through
the Plateau’s southern portion,
Through a gradual process known as ’Headwater
Erosion’!
For the river flowing at a steeper gradient along
the ‘Grand Staircase’ of the Plateau, carried
stones, rocks and debris,
Which formed the cutting tools, deepening the
Canyon over countless centuries!
When the softer sedimentary layers of the Plateau
below the top rocky layers gave away, - it resulted
in several rock falls!
While flash floods and erosion continued to breach
the sides of the canyon walls!
Thus over millions of years the width of the Canyon
gradually increased;
While the gushing and untamed Colorado River
chiseled through the depths of those Cyclopean walls, -
running deep!
Now the ancient Lake Bidahochi which had breached its
banks, had captured our pristine Colorado;
And their combined power increased the volume of
water and river’s chiseling power, with its rapid flow!

ENDANGERED COLORADO RIVER :
It is unfortunate that today, the Colorado no longer
reach the mighty Pacific as in the olden days!
With the progress of civilization and the spawning
of big cities,
Like Denver, Las Vegas, Phoenix and Los Angeles;
And to cater for the agricultural farmlands and the
Industries,
Many dams got built to divert its water and to
generate electricity!
Thus over a century of overuse and abuse of this
precious natural resource,
Gradually choked up the great Colorado, as it
became a mere trickle at the end of its course!
Ecologists now debate, while USA has launched
‘Save the Colorado River Project’!
Let us now cheer up by getting back to our
Grand Canyon’s scenic beauty,
Before concluding this wondrous Canyon Story!

SUN RISES AND SETS OVER GRAND CANYON!
To see the sunrise from Mather, Yaki, or the
Hopi Point, - located on the Southern Rim,
Becomes a life time experience, better than any
surreal dream!
First a glimmer then a glow, when a faint blue-white
sheen begins to show!
As the sun gradually sprinkles its light, streaks of
crimson red spreads across the eastern sky!
Soon orange and yellow shafts of light, light up the
Canyon walls up high!
Squirrels scurry out of sight, and birds twitter in
the sky!
The Hummingbird hovers like a helicopter, and
Big Horn sheep are also seen;
The Hummingbird which can even fly backwards,
enlivens this early morning scene!
The sun now rising in its resplendent glory,
showers the canyon with its kaleidoscopic beams;
With streaks of yellow, gold and red, it chases out
lurking shadows from within!
Like a curtain lifting before their eyes, the tourists
view this panoramic sight!
As the Grand Canyon awakens to greet the day,
With cameras madly clicking away!
The great ancestors of the Hopi tribe, Hopi
meaning both peaceful and wise;
Had inhabited these areas some eight thousand
years hence!
Their scooped out granaries and tools found inside
Canyon walls, - have an ancient story to tell !
The Spaniards were the first Europeans to reach,
in search for gold which they never found!
But for the Hopis the Canyon remains, as their
sacred Holy ground!
When those Spaniards saw the Colorado way
down below, from the Canyon’s upper rim’s side;
They said that this thin blue streaked River, was
barely five feet wide! (In mid-16th century)
The average width of the Canyon is around 10 miles;
While the River at its narrowest point is 600 yards
wide!
The Condor the largest American bird, catching an
upward draft circles up high;
Like an uncrowned monarch he surveys his kingdom
below, nothing escapes his watchful eyes!
Temperature at the Canyon’s floor is 20 degrees
higher, when compared to its outer rim;
Supports an ecosystem of plants and animals,
With the river as chief nourisher of all things!
Evergreen pines and furs grow along the cooler
areas of the Canyon’s outer rim;
While cactus species are found on its arid floor,
Their exotic flowers bloom during Summer and Spring!
The Northern Rim a thousand feet higher, offers many
spectacular sites!
But the Southern Rim remains open throughout the
year, while the Northern closes during Winter time.
From the Hopi Point west of the Canyon, the visitors
enjoy the beauty of the silent, sinking sun;
When the sky gets diffused with vermillion red, as
darkening shadows engulf those Canyon walls!
The mighty Canyon with its Cyclopean walls,
perhaps the playground of the Titans from eons past;
Shaped by some mythical Vulcan, shall remain till
this World continues to last!

CONCLUDING THE GRAND CANYON STORY:
I conclude my Grand Canyon Story by quoting a
poem I had once read;
Written by an Anonymous author, whose name
I had failed to get!
“BUILT WITH PATIENCE OF ENDLESS TIME,
YEARS ERODE AND SHAPES DEFINE.
LAYERS YIELD THEIR COUNTLESS AGE,
EYES CAN SEE BUT CANNOT GAUGE!
STAND AGAPE WITH AWE INSPIRED,
IMAGE READS OF LIFE TRANSPIRED.
CLIFFS REACH OUT TO TOUCH THE SKY,
PATHS LEAD DOWN WHERE RIVER LYE.
COLORS, SHAPES AND SHADOWS MELD,
HERE, A PLACE FOREVER HELD.
WALK AWAY YET NEVER PART,
BODY LEAVES BUT NOT THE HEART!”
- Anonymous
……………………………………………………………
ALL COPYRIGHTS WITH THE AUTHOR RAJ NANDY
OF NEW DELHI, E-MAIL: rajnandy21@yahoo.in

The earth’s been our playground, beautiful and vast.
A utopian world on which the human race was cast.
In the sliver of time, we’ve been an industrial culture
We’ve preyed on her resources like a ravenous vulture.

A carnivore hunting for bigger and fatter game,
All in the guise of improving and seeking for fame.
Inventors create contraptions and devices,
Never bothering to notice how much smaller the ice is.

Carbon is aplenty, spewing forth in filthy emission
Ozone suffering from man with limited vision.
Many animals hunted to extinction, and more on the way
Ecologists fight to be heard, to government's policies sway

Our waters suffer abuse and lose their purity
Advances in culture, lend earth no security
Oil and garbage circle the earth killing the wildlife off it,
Inventions and efforts to save us, offer no profit.

Efforts must be made to lower and stop pollution  
All species soon will be dead without a solution.
Let’s work together and help clean mother earth.
What’s our future generations’ health really worth?

A partner we should be, and not a voracious parasite,
We are cognizant beings; we should know to do what’s right.
Love the earth, give back more than you take,
Do it now, do it fast, for our children’s sake.

Ecologists  only  interested
                    in
Different processes that studies
                    Physical
Changes of forms and gradual
              upward movement
                   of
Living being.
Physical evolution shows upscale
            but what about mind and vital ?
Is there Devolution in faculty
                    of
Mind and vital plane ?
If not,what is the terrorism ?
Are Darwin and Lemarks wrong?
                  or
science is in child state to understand
                  the Life ?

how sensible it all seems, how crew-cut and with enough
anaesthetic to k.o. an elephant - outside the laboratories
the populists in whatever guise march on - as with any
congregation, atheists also muster up enough social muscle:
they too have their bouncers and other
gob-smackers with knuckle dusters -
as long as science is popularised it pushes
the boundaries of insensible chasms elsewhere -
                             but with so futile popularisation:
shortages in respective sectors: mandatory,
or as suggested: no longer rich bachelors and
         private laboratories - a science of regurgitation -
once they burned heretics, now the subtle
        championing of mingy sedatives - and since
Joan of Arc's heart no longer aspires to passion
and its all consuming fire, it turns into a wet
piece of coal - reining in the crowds of pop culture
zombies - said before, said again - but how
dislodged the feelings not ranging into absurdity
or at least nibbling on the zest of Dionysus;
but how things changed from that year, 2006,
everyone is asking, the poncy pope with glamorous
attire, the stiff-necked scientists - the pendulum
of guilt swinging in both directions - half of
the 20th century prescribed a fear magnanimously:
oddly enough - as implying: we forgive your
puny religious swooning and answering with
the easiest answers possible... here's a bomb -
so who are the sacred ones? they too are human -
the magazine dissected into:
a. what is reality? (can we be sure that the world
  we experience is not just a figment of our
    imagination) by roger penrose
     b. do we have free will? (the more we find
out about the brain works, the less room there
  seems to be for personal choice or responsibility)
     by patricia churchland
c. what is life? (if we encounter alien life,
chances are we wouldn't recognise it - not even
if it was here on earth) by robert hazen
d. is the universe deterministic?
   (however you look at it, the answer seems to be "maybe")
       by vlatko vedral
   e. what is consciousness? ("my soul is a hidden
    orchestra... all i hear is the music" - fernando pessoa)
            by paul brooks
f. will we ever have a theory of everything?
    (2000 years of rational inquiry may be approaching
  their crowning glory. just one more push could
   be enough...)
                            by michio kaku
   g. what happens after you die? (we have all
  wondered if there is an afterlife, but only a few are brave -
or foolish - enough to try and find out)
                                by mary roach
  h. what comes after **** sapiens?
  (all species are fated either to die out or to evolve
  into something else. all except humans, that is)
                   by james hughes -
so there we have it - the respective pillars of science,
whereby science replaces core beliefs into
core questions - to not hold firm, but to constantly
sway - the 8 founding questions - no more,
  no less - but how many people can perpetually sway?
   the supposed 8 universals, i.e. that every human
  being might, might not, will or will not ask -
     and for these 8 universals, exponential functions
of particulars: because that's how it's supposed
to be: chaotically democratic -
thus everyone knows the objectivity standard:
at its core is awe, outside the core pathology and
apathy - or let us say: passions and indifference -
then subdivisions of (+) and (-), and in general:
   however it is you feel: compensated or left starving.
in 2006, they congregated at a round table and
spoke god-this, god-that - no minority report,
  cold evidence never went down with women (or
so i'm told), three questions, question 1:
                 should science do away with religion?
oddly enough R. Dawkins said:
               "no doubt there are many people who do need
religion, and far be it from me to pull the rug from
under their feet." - we know that the bestseller
              the god delusion came out shortly after.
a physicist (S. Weinberg) similarly (c me la ri lee):
   "science can't provide a sense of magic about the world,
or a community of fellow-believers. there's a
religious mentality that yearns for that."
  L. Krauss: the success of science does not encompass
the entirety of human intellectual experience.
on and on this goes - i guess they have to debate for
the sake of debate - as i am sure everyone is aware:
   a debate can overpower the point of prayer -
confessions? i treat it more like poetry - but in saying
that... where is the medical profession in all of this?
we have astronomers, ecologists, biologists,
physicists, astrophysicists, planetary scientists,
cosmologists, philosophers... what's the odd one out?
it's a bit suspicious that this magazine does not
cite any chemists... and that's ****** obvious...
they're the ones making pacts with the devil -
whether Goethe's or Marlowe's Faust -
then at least to the more obscure rendition
of Pan Twardowski (Herr Tvardovsky) -
         but how odd it already is that chemists haven't
joined ranks with other scientists in their little
Friday night debating club meetings - seriously?
are those boffins serious about all of this?
            or as one said it:
i came from learning to write CO for carbon monoxide,
   and FeO for ferric oxide - or drawing electron migration
  diagrams when two compounds interact (a nice
playground of symbols) and went my way into
   some form of linguistics - primarily working on
          the tetragrammaton - i have no major interest
beyond this definition: would i debate the most
difficult metaphysical assumption of the omni-variations
in terms of ascribing the variations to a being?
i'd stumble in the metaphysical world on omnipresence,
meaning i would be a pantheist - meaning god
    would be anything and everything from the moon,
a mouse, an ant colony, my **** and what not -
            the all-in-one: for one thing, that's already much
too hellish to comprehend, let alone make comedy from.
but they haven't told you about the painkilling
saliva that beats morphine - catherine rougeo:
proceedings of the national academy of sciences,
vol. 103, p. 17979) - the compound's name? opiorphin,
or the scourge of Afghanistan. they also didn't
tell you about Saracen sabres - their scimitars contained
carbon nanotubes - forged from Indian steel
called wootz - 17th century examples studied by
P. Paufler (Dresden) found the carbon nanotubes
and even nanowires (nature, vol. 444, p. 286) -
or is this becoming to look very much like traffic
on London's M25 during rush-hour? it certainly is,
as was intended -
                   1950s: age of optimism -
influenza wave from the east, the indestructible transistor,
   television without wires, baby computer the size of
  a piano, rubber windshields, genetic chemistry,
atomic aircraft, the neutrino, sputnik 1, strontium-90
(radioactive ash)  used by manufacturers of woven
and knitted fabrics to overcome fog markings,
the coleopter, polypropylene (the remnants of German
word-compounding revealed in chemistry, and
only in chemistry, elsewhere compounding is
replaced by hyphenation, i.e. hyphenating),
                  and so on and so forth until present day -
passing through Sir, Julian, Huxley, who reinvented
****** with "positive" eugenics - oh sure, it was still
alive and kicking - quark hunters draw a blank -
             i could reference all else that was involved
in making the last 60 years - beyond that people are
call it ancient history - or are Virgil and as Horace,
and as Ovid did - turned their back to the world,
         into their poplar groves and jasmine filled gardens,
and said: ta'oh!           ta'oh!                 Tao!
  but not until then, before embarking i'm already
dreading to embark with something to add, to even
voice this -                                     but i guess i might:
  as ever, the freedom of speech is never as grand a
                                      luxury as the freedom to think.

/because you could really get a square, or any coherent mundane geometric narrative of re- re- re-... out of a *******... or tell someone with a size 11 shoe, that a size 9 will be, just as comfortable... and while the English language goes to ****, thank **** it has no mother and has no son in the guise of me... with the current lexi- of non-cis non-binary yadda yadda abracadabra... a return to stern, dog breeding terminology... pedigree, mongrel... hybrid... can't really as the semite for an authentic opinion, came from a people that sat on their ***** for long watching chickens walk down a village dirt road... anything to redefine, those half-***** screaming into a tin-can tied to a string... after all, Greenwich... outside of the English speaking world, we like to call the natives: Greenwich bellybuttons, or rather,  bellybuttons of the world: pępki świata... as a person of acquired tastes, it's turning into a heartache, seeing english so deformed... perhaps by both technology and youth... a Frankenstein to behold... and when in Paris, did I speak any french? not really, but I had the audacity to cling to an Italian girl who could, and a Russo-Canadian girl, who also could... but you still managed to meet people who understood that english,  not french, was and is the lingua franca of tourism... obviously not so much when it comes to commerce... and banking, is not exactly a commerce... neither is the media... e.g.? re.: Münster... on the first day 3 people (not including the attacker) were killed and 30 injured... on the second day 2 people were killed (including the killer) and 20 injured... who the hell still thinks that the media juggernaut is a trebuchet to fling a Meursault into the limelight? it's naive to think that such people are seeking fame... a ******* butter knife and a glass of beer will always be more "famous"... and the man who discovered beer, well... good luck reading Plato... comes the staring into the abyss, and the abyss not staring back, whispering a words: ad absurdum counter ad nauseam...


too much love poetry, too much love
poetry that isn't risqué,
plain mundane out of fear...
a fear of being found dead 2 weeks
later...
not mundane to say the leat,
just: a zoological observation
of a lion, rather than stark naked
on th savannah...
or thereabouts...
                but to have to exhaust
poetry for love? this sort of love?
i prefer the memory of candyfloss
sitting on a stump of wood...
        maybe that's why i find the current
movies exhausting,
           bankrupt writing,
or rather,  current movies an modern
art, minimalism, minimalism,
large open spaces replaced by
   strobe c.g.i.
point being, when did the fallacy
of subjectivity come into
contact with dialectics?
   just asking,  because i somehow
cannot conceive an objectivity of one,
in that,  not having to cite
a bibliography, third part sources...
can't a subjective opinion
be just as true as an objective
herd nod?
    mesmerising that
     subjectivity should be deemed
as sub-dialectics,
           bellow engagement...
somehow contaminated...
are pronouns in that respect
subjective? silly question...
chess pro noun: or solving crosswords...
pro nouns, meaning:
in favour of remembering
  names of objects...
            and further into the exposed
muddle of atomised grammar...
objectivity is when you stress
   pre nouns...
   otherwise, someone is to be found
vehemently stressing a pivot
word, and that gives him or her away?
all of a sudden objectivity is
regarded with more respect,
      objectively, perhaps talking
about things with a blank canvas,
orientating oneself where
you're not allowed to use nouns...
the closest you can get to asking
a co-worker for a hammer on
a construction site is to hum a hmm...
is that objectivity?
        hence the classically mundane
narrative...
   because i just wanted to say
that a richness of one's own memory
creates a cinematic void...
i can't estimate how many hours
I've sat drinking, more entertained
by my memories, than any recent film...
just like today, having refreshed
a pale nectarine kitchen with
lemon peel... i already started thinking
about the corridor...
                  but before that, during
the day...
    why is spring in England,
why is summer in England...
  so... ******?! i wish there was
a better word for it...
     god i've missed continental spring...
i haven't experienced, continental
spring for... 22 years...
                  deep continental spring,
past Germany,  above the Balkans
below the Baltic...
      22 years of 22 springs,
spent on that bog of a sinking ship
known as England...
rain... rain... more rain...
     dampness and 21 Beehive Ln.
Gants Hill just across the synagogue
above the estate agent...
    dampness and those *******
   woodlice...
          22 years having spent each mid
April to late May under
earl Grey the ******* ponce...
                     no one I sleep better
in this part of the world,
the body has synchronised itself
with the fauna and a heritage past
and the mind seems revived...
to the scents of waking trees,
   to the sight on national news
of bears waking from their wintry
hibernation in the Tatra mountains...
ecologists testing mosquito repellents,
anti-rabies snacks dropped into forests
for foxes to eat...
         and only the one direction
traffic of English... comes a headache
having to listen to it, comes easier writing
about it...
              hence the old woman decided
to take my case of the presidium...
tomorrow i'll have my photo taken,
take my British passport,
declare myself as myself before
a bureaucratic piece of paper
with a signature, wait less than two weeks
and get my Polish citizen identification card...
plan B...
       just in case...
          just in case it becomes normal
for spring and seeing so many
children playing outside the 2nd level
balcony overlooking a graveyard...
boys as old as 6 / 7 playing with
wooden swords...
     teenagers sitting on benches
in the cool night till 10:30 pm...
                               and everything else
worth living for, lived in a small town...
far away from the London rats...
     far away from a country that understands
bilingualism as schizophrenia...
              maybe i am mad,
but the ones who think I am, are no more
sane...
                than me...
                                first thing's first...
with a snap of the fingers,
i can retain my dual-nationality,
and perhaps, after a while,
after I stop finding the study of psychiatry
by studying psychiatric blunders
a bit boring...
            and say auf wiedersehen to
ol' ***** 'n' Charlie Ambrose...
                                                 honestly,
england's worth of its very misery...
    its hardball when attached to the mainland,
a nation of thespians,
     hard this, soft that,
                   nuns instead of frisky youth...
or at least: for the joy of life
at first, prior to the sentiments of
adulthood, and shackles,
as was once done in a spring field
or on top of a hay stack;
              which... makes it doubly
uncomprehensive...
     ad to why someone's father might
force himself to forget his mother tongue. ..
with his son not being able to speak it,
suddenly reaching for
         a bomb making kit, a knife,
a car or an assault rifle...
            that sort of grievance?
as the old testament ends with a hope...
not till the heart of the son
turns to the father, and likewise
reciprocated...
                       shame for the collateral
damage... truly, shameful...
but you'd think that a son could
realise his beef,  is with his immigrant father
and not the host nation...
            because a return to the past
or, the body to the land,
the land to the mind, and mind to
the tongue, and the tongue to the breath,
and the breath to the soul,
   and the soul to the forefathers...
          kinda amrican, wouldn't you say so,
Herr Jefferson?