Damning Eden M. Kelsey Lane
Illustration by Ida Floreak
A secret Eden hides in the depths of the arid American West. A primordial ocean, once teeming with our earliest ancestors, is recorded in layer after layer of sandstone, shale, and limestone. Corals and sandy beaches are ground fine, deposited on ocean floors, lithified, cemented, and buried in colorful strata of mocha, salmon, beige, rose, and coral. This ancient landscape should hide hundreds of feet below the surface, but it lies exposed thanks to a force that could not be ignored. A steady stream of water began eroding particle after particle of sediment, transporting them downstream to the Pacific Ocean. Over time this torrent of water became the river we know today as the Colorado River. In the canyons of the Colorado River, the stark desert splits in half, creating an aquatic oasis. Small willows grow on the banks; chub and pike swim in the steady currents. The Grand Canyon is the most famous, but many other canyon systems formed by the Colorado River stretch across the American Southwest. It is now a dammed (or should I say damned?) Eden. Spring 2010
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