Tribal

(About being a child. The smell of fall triggers a waterfall of emotion.
  Freedom is lost to structure and the renewed experience of being chosen or rejected in the new/old social setting we call school)

Darkness falls earlier these days
Without fail
The melancholy wells up

Like thermal mud-pots
Boiling over
With pent up anticipation

Soon there will be a choosing
A renewing 
Confirmation of what I already know

The abyss in my stomach returns
As I reach out
Clumsily grasping for tree limbs

Eyes closed, over the cliff I go
Encircled by perfection
Conscious of every rejection

Life cycles ended in harvest
A new year
But we’re told it’s not yet new year

If I open my eyes
Will I hit bottom?

Oils on canvas – 16″x20″
The sixties was a time when a child would grow up outside. Mothers would tell their children “go outside and play”. We would….oh we would. We were almost feral….until it was time for dinner.
Going “back to school” robbed us of that freedom, and brought the testing of our worldly social skills to the fore. Some of us were very good at it. Some of us simply blended into the lead-painted siding.
Fall for me has always been painted with these experiences, even after all these years.

Sittin’ On A Fence

Sittin’ on a fence
‘Cause I couldn’t decide
Should I travel through the portal
To the other side?

There ain’t much here
‘Cept this fence and me
A coupl-a bushes
A coupl-a trees

And they’re boring!
So boring.
Never talk, nope, they never talk.
They never laugh or sing either!
Just get pushed ’round by the breeze.
That’s all….just sorta hmmmmm
And hmmmmm…or swoosh swoosh swoosh
Like that.

I don’t know why I stay here!
I should just fly through that portal
And find a rEAl AdveTuRe!

That’s what I should do.



A Little Butterfly

In front of me
A tiny butterfly
So precious
Delicate
So little!

Behind me
A rising moon
A star we call the sun
A universe
With hundreds
Of billions
Of galaxies

Such a beautiful
Little butterfly

Butterfly pic is a single exposure, Lensbaby photograph.


At a distance of just 160 000 light-years, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) is one of the Milky Way’s closest companions. (Courtesy of NASA’s Hubble)
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/multimedia/index.html

Changed

Traffic billows
Clouds of disagreement
Heat rising from its midnight
Fumaroles to be embraced
While slowly killing us

This short journey quickly ends
Beyond the bounds
Of the enchanted forest
Where I will be changed again
To a time when everything was wonder

The door slams
Feet hit the pavement
And time begins to slow
A swirl of life
Circles about my head

Men and women in spandex
Bicycle to conquer
Run to escape and to find
Newer selves
Changed in heaving breaths
Pushing out the old self

Beyond the fumaroles
Lies the path
That will swallow me whole
And without a sound
Will make me a child again

When I started making photographs, I rediscovered the child in me. Easily impressed with life forms….like the simple guppy. A few days ago I witnessed a hummingbird courting his mate. He flew high and hovered, then swooshed down. During his upturn, his tail feathers made a “chirp” sound. A physical manifestation created at almost 9G’s of force. The forest is full of stories like that.

Across the Lake

These laws these laws
Physics and integrated biology

Our bodies
A mass of intelligent proteins
“I will be an arm” says one
“I will be an eye” says another

These laws, these laws
Physics and integrated biology

Discerning the atmospheres
First, our light airy cosmos
Little is the effect of gravity
‘Til water marries us up – it is inescapable

Why must I be a bonded slave
To the one?
Not to move quietly
Through the other.

We close our eyes
Through imagination’s window
We become fully capable
Traversing these laws
And cross to the other side

What will we “see”?

Originally, I started to write an informative photography tutorial entry, but became too bored with the subject. Maybe another time. Apparently, I am too easily distracted.