Simian Awe

Nonsense is an assertion of man's spiritual freedom
in spite of all the oppressions of circumstance.
-- Aldous Huxley

Humor is just another defense against the universe.
-- Mel Brooks

I agree. I believe in what I refer to as "the dark and twisted little laugh." It saves me from the shadows every time.

Click on image to enlarge. The photo was taken 2/16/11.

Monkey Love Tulip

Monkey love tulip. Spring. Soon. Really.

The monkey also has a baby. The baby is its own kind of wonderful. (Beware, I'm sure other photos will follow.) The attached antique shop price tag was highly entertaining: "Celluloid monkeys AS IS -- wind up not workin, hole in baby's face." You can't wait to see that baby, now can you?

The photograph was taken this afternoon at my house. Thanks, Cindy S-J for the fabulous birthday monkey and baby. You knew I could no way, no how live without them. Simian bliss.

Simply click on photo to enlarge image.

Magic Skylight

I say one must be a seer, make oneself a seer. The poet makes himself a seer by an immense, long, deliberate derangement of all the senses.

-- Arthur Rimbaud, Letter to Paul Demeny [May 15, 1871]

This is my magic skylight, sharing its own odd perspective on the world through its frame of thawing ice. When you look up through it, it toys with your orientation in space. I like that dizzy sensation, the momentary vision of the world as a new and thrilling place. In one of its earlier incarnations, fully covered with layers of ice, the skylight allowed enough light through to become a three-dimensional Mark Rothko painting. This morning its frame has melted and cracked, leaving the naked trees looming like crackled varnish, patterns backlit by February sun. I praise its kaleidoscope eye.

The photograph was taken 2/6/11.