In an effort to escape from the destruction and chaos I –and the whole country—witnessed this week in our hallowed grounds of the U.S. Capitol, I headed to one of my refuges: Rocky Mountain National Park. A few weeks ago, the Park Service had announced the reopening of several areas in the park that had been consumed by wildfires in October.
One of them was Moraine Park, one of the iconic places in RMNP, a broad open valley surrounded by high peaks, with a creek that meanders in summer through tall grasses and willow bushes. In fall, it’s the favorite place to view the huge elk herds that come down from the high country and to listen to the male elk “bugle” their threats against other bulls.
But there were no elk in Moraine Park this week, because there’s no grass to eat. Instead, a swath of black scorched earth ran in a straight line through the valley, like a river of destruction. Many of the willow bushes were burnt or gone altogether, and aspen and ponderosa trees were toppled. Instead of grasses surrounding the creek, it was bordered by charred soil. The blackened trunks of pines lay on the ground, and whole hillsides were devoid of anything except boulders (left). A large juniper tree had lost all its needles, while the branches stretched out, as if pleading with the heavens.
It was a scene of desecration, a ruined and mostly empty landscape, and I could only imagine the ferocity of the flames that tore through this valley, whipped up by strong winds. I can only imagine the number of small animals, such as chipmunks and ground squirrels, that couldn’t escape the inferno. The silence testified to their absence.
And yet, a surprising number of trees still stood. Although some of the giant ponderosa pines were blackened at the bottom of their trunks, with their roots sunk deep into the rocky ground, the rest of the tree still looked healthy with green needles. Around one of the trees was a clump of pine cones— perhaps a promise of new life. Some of the aspen also were burned at their base, yet remained standing, although it will be spring before we see if the leaves emerge and how many survived.
I remembered the last time a fire raged through Moraine Park in October 2012. When I visited the park the following June, the grasses in the park were more lush and thick than I had seen in decades.
In this blackened and too quiet landscape, there’s hope. Hope that the grasses will return in summer, that the pines still standing will survive, that the aspens, with their interconnected roots, will leaf out come May, and that the elk and smaller creatures will return.
Amid the dead trees and the smell of burnt earth, I heard a bird sing. There’s always hope.