Are India’s Elephants Blessed Creatures or Indentured Servants?

Photographs of Majestic Animals Caught Between Two Roles—and Two Eras

In 2011, I visited the magnificent Amber Fort in Jaipur, in the Rajasthan region of India. The beautiful Hindu-style architecture of the fort is adorned with large ramparts and cobbled paths that overlook Maota Lake, where elephants give tourists rides. I was enchanted watching these majestic animals as they slowly and meticulously walked among people and cars without a glance sideways. They were dignified and elegant, and I was fascinated by the textures in their skin, large tusks, and flapping ears.

When a guide invited me to see a newborn …

By Annette Bonnier | December 15, 2015

Prayer

By Heather Treseler | November 28, 2015

November and the metallic whine of schoolyard
swings trawls me back to the confused daze
of childhood in which the only rules stricter

than my mother’s nuns were my own bylaws:

Paying Homage to a Great American Poet

While Henry David Thoreau Preached Simplicity, Lorine Niedecker Simply Lived It

By Siobhan Phillips | October 20, 2015

On a sunny Saturday in August, I stood at a one-room cabin near the outskirts of Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin, thinking about the great American poet Lorine Niedecker. She lived …

Another Beginning

By Max Schleicher | October 9, 2015

In the beginning, all the world was America.
Sharp rainy seasons, skies scaled with mica.
Bright wind. Brittle lakes. The air would flinch
with lightning and a flex of nameless …

Painting En Plein Air

A Group of Visual Artists Comes Together in the Wide-Open Expanses of Joshua Tree

By Krista Wargo | October 2, 2015

The High Desert Plein Air Artists is an informal group that meets the third Saturday of the month at various locations in and around Joshua Tree National Park.

We …

After Learning of a Friend’s Suicide, We Drive to the Cuyahoga Valley National Park

By Brian Brodeur | September 25, 2015

In trees along the Bath Road rookery,
a siege of herons broods. Their long necks kink.
Their nests clump bare branches like flood debris.
Settling with a click in icy …

nature

Are India’s Elephants Blessed Creatures or Indentured Servants?

Photographs of Majestic Animals Caught Between Two Roles—and Two Eras

Prayer

Paying Homage to a Great American Poet

While Henry David Thoreau Preached Simplicity, Lorine Niedecker Simply Lived It

Another Beginning

Painting En Plein Air

A Group of Visual Artists Comes Together in the Wide-Open Expanses of Joshua Tree

After Learning of a Friend’s Suicide, We Drive to the Cuyahoga Valley National Park

Get More Zócalo

India the Question Mark

Does Its Potential Match the Hype?

Finding Community at a Kathmandu Temple

Nepal Is Full of Places of Worship, But I Keep Going Back to Pashupati Nath

A Letter From India, Where the World Is Collapsing

The Official Count of Cases and Deaths Doesn’t Reflect the Full Tragedy Unfolding Here

The 1938 Hurricane That Revived New England’s Fall Colors

An Epic Natural Disaster Restored the Forest of an Earlier America

Get More Zócalo