Vasey’s Paradise is one of the many precious fresh water springs that decorate the corridor of the Colorado River through Grand Canyon. Named after a botanist friend of John Wesley Powell, this spring hosts a vibrant array of life, from maidenhair fern, to cardinal monkey flower.

The springs in Grand Canyon seem almost paradoxical, sitting in their arid, desert scrub context. They feel like a mirage, teeming with so much biodiversity that it seems entirely surreal. These springs are home to 500x the biodiversity of the surrounding areas and are habitat to a number of endemic species.

When I first came to Grand Canyon in 2018, I was dazzled by the gushing clear waters of Vasey’s Paradise. However, year after year, I watched as the water flowing from the limestone dissipated from a roar to a dwindling trickle.

But after the historical and anomalous winter of 2022-2023, I returned in April to find Vasey’s flowing with the same ferocity as the first time I saw it. It was enough to give you chills. I had no idea that the aquifer that feeds this spring could recharge that quickly. It filled me with a bittersweet false hope for our environmental future: nature’s resilience and ability to heal, but also the reality of what a fleeting promise of water that particular winter provided the Southwest.

This painting is an ode to the moments of awe on that first trip back to Grand Canyon last April. I had never seen the Grand Canyon so abundantly alive. May we be reminded of all we have lost, and all we can save.