No no no no no no no no no no no no
It’s not that big!
It’s a trick, done with mirrors
And lenses, to make a quick
Tourist buck and tourist cameras click.
It’s a backdrop, a set, a photoshoot,
A cheap prop, a flat
With a false sense of perspective.
They pack it away at night you know –
Stack the layers of sandstone substitute
In the back of a ute they park in the
Dark in the back of the park,
Flatten the folds so it’s a plain again,
They do – it’s true – it’s a national lark,
And tourists are its laughing stock.
There is no river, there is no rock,
No layer upon layer of limestone or shale,
No canyon, no crevice, no craggy cliff face,
No strata conglomerate of time and space.
It’s all a sham, a Great Unconformity,
A geological joke of such enormity
That it makes you wonder who’s taking the piss.
Because cameras and tourists are all there is,
With tripods and filters and telephoto lenses,
Exposing that only an image exists.
That dusty hole obsessing the view finder
Is just a reflection of the aggregate
Of awe encrusted foreign mouths
That gape back at it.
Like an open shutter,
It’ll close in a flash.
It’s a hoax, a scam, a lie of the land,
A pink elephant, a flying pig,
Need I go on? It doesn’t exist. It is not …
… that big.
