The Hour of Land: A Personal Topography of America’s National Parks

327 Pages·2016·4.03 MB·English

by  Terry Tempest Williams

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Table of Contents
About the Author
Copyright Page

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For
Steven Barclay
My heart found its home long ago in the beauty, mystery, order
and disorder of the flowering earth.
—LADY BIRD JOHNSON
© Lee Friedlander, courtesy Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco
A NOTE TO THE READER
LANGUAGE AND LANDSCAPE are my inspiration. The poet Jorie Graham has been
my muse in The Hour of Land. Her poem “WE,” published in the London
Review of Books on January 8, 2015, has led me line by line through the
unknown territory of these twelve national parks. Her prescience on the page and
insightful intelligence offered me a poetic crossing.
Edward Hirsch defines “a poetic crossing” as that “which follows the arc
from physical motion to spiritual action … into another type of consciousness, a
more heightened reality. It is a move beyond the temporal, a visionary passage.”
When walking in the desert, I look for cairns to guide me, the careful
placement of stones stacked one by one as a small monument to direction. Jorie
Graham’s words have been my directive. She has graciously given permission to
use these thirteen lines as a passage into these parks. For this, I am grateful. Each
of her lines is represented in italics at the beginning of each essay.
As a poet and a friend, Jorie remains a fierce and uncommon grace.
*
Frish Brandt has guided the curation of the photographs inside The Hour of
Land. Her wisdom and artistic edge as president of the Fraenkel Gallery have not
only expanded my view of national parks, but shaped it. I honor her joyous
contribution and the generosity of all the photographers who agreed to be part of
this project. Their images create an emotional landscape alongside the physical
one explored through each park in this book. By touching the essence of a place,
another kind of poetic crossing is made.
*
Collaboration is the only way forward.
AMERICA’S NATIONAL PARKS
By definition