Rosa's Garden of Earthly Delights

 

'It'

 

I'm revisiting images of the many faces of Keefer Lake, my home. This is a 'redo' of a photo taken in April, 2009. The thickest and strangest fog/mist formed over the ice on the lake in a pastel 'winter blue' I had not seen before. It was like being inside a Salvador Dali painting! Although we often have ice fog we have not had anything quite like this one ever since.

What follows is a (very) short story of mine written in the same year the photo was made ... the story and the photo seemed related somehow - at least to me?

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Finding it, solving it, living it.

Cool blue seemed to describe what he was seeing. It was soon dark and with it he feared he would be left to himself and he knew from experience that was not safe. How to feel it seemed always to be the fundamental problem but there were countless other difficulties that he constantly confronted and tonight seemed no different. Why is it that the ordinary takes priority over the real issue? Laziness, he supposes … do what is in front of you and brighter in your eyes rather than deal with the shadows in your mind, the things that are off to the side.

With the passing of those thoughts the blue was already gone and only patches of grey lined the horizon and shaped the trees and lake in front of him. Black and white would be easier he mused, grey was the problem of course. Joseph had always known that the lake would be the place where he found it and solved it. However, there was little warmth yet and more to be done. It wasn’t a case of deciding where to start because he knew already there was no beginning. He wasn’t even sure if there would be an ending? What to do at any given time about it he had concluded is about energy and attitude and distractions. The right proportions are essential and even distraction is needed in a measured and timely way. He had not seen in any sustained way that magical place … only glimpsing it from time-to-time although that was enough and it kept him coming back. Joseph often claimed that his only enduring trait was curiosity although he was credited by others as having more. He didn’t seem to care or need their praise and usually shrunk from it when it was offered … shyness perhaps, perhaps not? He reasoned that it wasn’t relevant anyway and wouldn’t help with finding it.

Idleness is, a friend of, maybe a prerequisite to the pursuit of it and Joseph had time on his hands now. You had to be sure though that the distractions of idleness didn’t overwhelm the quest. It was too easy to see them as reprieves when really they were quest busters. Peace of mind was not the same as the lack of stress that sometimes accompanies idleness and Joseph believed it was all about finding peace of mind. The glimpses of it had shown him that idleness only provided a useful means for having time to chase after the peace. “Maybe it wasn’t so much as chase, as follow” Joseph concluded. Curious people are often alone with their thoughts and comfortable in them. Thinking is not being idle although it might appear to be that to those observing. 

MJH, 2009

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'Studies in Abstraction'

 

'All Hail Tardy Spring'

 

'White Walkers'

 This photo was taken last week ... we have had a week of warm weather and high winds. Keefer Lake is ice free as of today. Hurrah ... welcome Spring!

'Tree Textures' A dodecatych'

 

'You go your way and I'll go mine' (Parque das Nações, Lisbon, Portugal)

 

I suppose you could say that poetry runs in my family - although it's unlikely anyone other than me would ever find themselves saying any such thing. My father's uncle is/was W.H. Davies; a Welsh poet who was rightly overshadowed by his contemporary, Dylan Thomas. I have sporadically written poems since my teenage 'angst years' and the other day I composed a short ditty 'On Photography.' One of my nieces is a real poet who often writes poems to accompany my photographs which I then attach to the photo's description. There are dozens of them by now all of which are included in an album entitled 'Photos w Poetry, Music, Lyrics and More' which can be viewed here: <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/canadapt/albums/72157718175008721">www.flickr.com/photos/canadapt/albums/72157718175008721</a>

I emailed my poem 'On Photography' to my niece who emailed back to me - literally within minutes - a poetic rejoinder to my verse. Both poems are included below. 

I have chosen a street shot taken years ago in Lisbon to accompany the poems. The title for the picture is - of course - from a Dylan song. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPRzHqAEpZk" rel="noreferrer nofollow">www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPRzHqAEpZk</a>

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'On Photography'

My shutter finger travels to the sun and back
In one sixtieth of a second
Or a fraction more 
Or a fraction less

With an eye wide open at once
Or squinting to take it all in
Looking at length and then
Wide afield and then
Up close
Through rose coloured glass.

My vision ... coloured
My thoughts ... black and white
My thinking ... dark and light

Say what I see
See what I mean
Do you?

It doesn't really matter
To me
Either way
Except to me
Either way ... it matters.

@M. Hill (2022)

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'Picture This'

 

“Picture this!” he proclaimed for all to see,   

And then posted it for all to see.

“Do you see what I see?” he dared

To all who might care as he cared.

“Do you care to see as I see?” he asked,

“Or would you be overtaxed?”

So the photographer wends his camera lens

At sights to him that make the worthiest sense,

Afar, near, up or down, it is all there

In detail or a blur, his soul’s laid bare.

Colour, light or not, or shadow’s cast

Contour and texture are all contrast.

Rose coloured or stark, whatever that vision be,

Whomever pictures this, is free to see.

@C. Hill (2022)