Shadow Embrace

I like the way these elongated shadows embrace the tree like needy hooks or fantastic thorns. Aren't there great patterns and textures in the bark? Such an invitation to fingertips. And that March washed-blue sky shining in the background.

There is a blind niche in the azure:
in each blessed noon
one fateful star trembles,
hinting at the depth of night.
-- Osip Mandelstam, tr. by Clarence Brown & W.S. Merwin

Mandelstam wrote a poem (#133) containing this deep and piercing stanza in 1922. It became part of Poems, published in 1928. I found it in The Selected Poems of Osip Mandelstam, translated from the Russian by Brown and Merwin, New York Review Books, 2004, translation copyright 1973. (See page 43, third stanza.)

Mandelstam was arrested and exiled in 1934, after he read a work denouncing Stalin. I found it fascinating that his wife, Nadezhda, memorized his writing, so that it would be preserved even if his papers were lost or destroyed. When his exile ended in 1937, he returned to Moscow, but was arrested again and sentenced to hard labor in Siberia. According to the book notes, he was "last seen in a transit camp near Vladivostok."

Here is Mandelstam's belief about the necessity of poetry:

The people need poetry that will be their own secret
to keep them awake forever,
and bathe them in the bright-haired wave of its breathing.
-- Osip Mandelstam, tr. by Clarence Brown & W.S. Merwin

(From the introduction, p. xiii.)

The photograph was taken on my hill, just the other afternoon. Click on image to enlarge.

I Cast a Shadow on My House

Meandering, looking for something intriguing to catch my eye, I caught a glimpse of my shadow trailing along the side of my house. How fleeting, how insubstantial: a blue-gray silhouette always on the cusp of disappearing. I let it rest for a moment against the sun-warmed wood siding, then pulled it over the edge and across the snow-patched lawn.

This afternoon I revisited "Light," a wonderful, shadow-filled prose poem by David Lazar from his newest collection, Powder Town:

Light

What is the morality of light, I wonder, years after it might have made a difference?

A shadow spills from a man with a fedora onto a pavement that is whiter than it should be. But the shadow stands between the man and the sun, and by the angle of his hat, I'm not sure if the man has gotten away with something. But the shadow knows.

For years I went around not understanding the meaning of "opaque." I tried to bluff every once in awhile, but always had the feeling that others could see through me.

We played a game called silly silhouettes. We mimed everything from the first moments of Paradise to playing a quick game of blackjack with someone's skull. We did this as a kind of light amusement to pass the time. Until Primavera mimed Johnny Three-Fingers taking a long hard fall. That was just a little too real.

One afternoon, my girl and I were in the country when the light struck. It was that brilliant late afternoon light that makes you so happy it's scary. It's a memory light, a light that seems to hold everything. And I realized that it reminded me of a day when I was young when the same light hit and reminded me of a day when I was younger. By the time it passed, and all it takes is a shade of difference to lose the effect, I realized my girl was nowhere to be seen.

-- David Lazar
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Doesn't that ending just hollow you out?

I love that late afternoon light, those searching gold fingers of light that suddenly hold up your life for you to see. Light that sends such long shadows writhing from your feet.

"Light" was reprinted here with permission of the author, David Lazar. It can be found on page 17 of Powder Town ( 2008) from Pecan Grove Press, San Antonio, Texas.

Tulip, Feather, Woodgrain

One line of poetry casts its shadow into the next, patterns repeat, contrasts in sound underscore meaning. Key words and images pop, leaping to the eye like glossy magenta against rough deep gray. The tendrils of each line extend into the next -- encircling, clinging, claiming -- until the poem is woven into a living whole, each word inextricable.

In this photo, I tried to capture the way repeating patterns, shapes, and shadows rippled through the tulip, feather, and woodgrain, uniting them in a still life.

Photo taken 5/13/08. Click on image to enlarge. For more about repeating patterns and contrast (and metaphor), scroll down to the 6/12/08 post.

Floating Daisies

I'm not sure why it gave me such calming pleasure to float African daisies (Osteospermum) in an old white bowl covered with big turquoise polka dots. But it did. I love the variety with the unusual purple "spooned" petals. (I believe it's called "Pink Whirls.") I also discovered that the daisies cast wonderful dancing shadows, like an animated child's drawing of flowers.

Photos were taken 5/13 and 5/14/08. Click on pictures to enlarge.