Utah with two longtime friends of mine.
It’s one of the most magnificent and
bizarre places I’ve ever been: giant,
jagged, obscenely pink ridges of rock jut
out of the ground like huge slabs of raw
meat; white, yellow, and purple towers
of sandstone stretch and twist into
sculptures made of taffy; deep cracks in
the earth’s surface form cathedral-like
slot canyons whose walls, smoothed
over from flash floods and sandstorms,
change colors from moment to moment
as the sun’s rays shift through the narrow
opening high above.
It’s like the moon. Only cooler.
We merrily trip through this alternate
universe, picking up colorful rocks,