The immortal cranes call, their cries sound from afar, their thoughts
circle upward into distant skies. Below, on the autumn rivers, stands
a man, above him the bright moon. The man wanders aimless, trailing after
the endless Milky Way. The wind blows past him. I, too, thinks the man, would like to be utterly free.

-Jiang Yi Ning

I want to live where soul meets body
And let the sun wrap its arms around me
And bathe my skin in water cool and cleansing
And feel, feel what its like to be new

Cause in my head there’s a greyhound station
Where I send my thoughts to far off destinations
So they may have a chance of finding a place
where they’re far more suited than here

I cannot guess what we'll discover
We turn the dirt with our palms cupped like shovels
But I know our filthy hands can wash one another’s
And not one speck will remain

I do believe it’s true
That there are roads left in both of our shoes
If the silence takes you
Then I hope it takes me too
So blue eyes I hold you near
Cause you’re the only song I want to hear
A melody softly soaring through my atmosphere

Where soul meets body

-Soul Meets Body Death Cab Cutie

looks so free, I love how white pelicans fly...

. . . for me there lies,
Within the lights and shadows of your eyes,
The only beauty that is never old.

   -James Weldon Johnson

lucky ducky

Everglades Snail Kite

What greatly worries me:

the extinction of birds

my little cares are really not much in comparison to this kind of speculation

Elegy for a Doe

She looked at me
two great brown eyes
swinging her ears forward
she hunched and rocked heaving
every inch gained slid back
the snow dark from the weight.

I am not done yet
two dead legs under me
the hill is not so far
a road hangs heavy
my eyes fill.

She is tired
the fight leaves in bitter cold
her last run is outward
on the echo of a gunshot.

--by the Corbyhawk, written to remember the deer that had been hit but not killed. I made the call to end her suffering but did not have the strength to see it happen. As for the other I decided that it is not so bad a thing and I will just be content in my little daydream. It helps me work, my hope that he is watching.

lift-off

I think this may be my last post for a bit,
you see I have to concentrate on my painting.

I so long to break rules, but instead I will paint it away
sorry and sad.

I leave you for a time with O'Keeffe,
"Making your unknown known is the important thing-and keeping the unknown always beyond you-catching-crystalizing [sic] your simpler clearer vision of life-only to see it turn stale compared to what you vaguely feel ahead-that you always must keep working to grasp-"

-Quote by Georgia O'Keeffe published in Portrait of an Artist by Laurie Lisle

Innocent Sunday morning
As plain as the Sunday before
I thought as she told me her story
I don't think I can hear these anymore

Charting a map of land mines
Asleep in the settling dust
How come we never remember
How many times you picked yourself up

Hey that's the way to go
We need to know pain to grow
But you're right it's a long way home...

When the day breaks into dark.
I think there's nothing more beautiful
Than a face that has come so far.

-Sarah Slean Bonnie's Song

worked all day,

a reason to not drive on thick ice

Whooping Cranes are coming back from the brink:

read here listen here

Lanner Falcon

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;






-W.B. Yeats The Second Coming

My drive home from work was stunning. The sun was just starting to change to the yellows of a winter sunset in a light blue sky. Ice still coats every tree and it just glowed with the light. It accented each attenuated tree limb like an outline of fire. I felt like I had been transported into some childhood fairyland. Everyone was driving a bit slower and I think today is the first time I have ever thought of a power line as beautiful. It was a literal power line, glowing bright yellow from the ice and fringing the road. These golden strings passed on upward arcs to a pole and then swooped down. I wondered at how I could paint light like this, pure light that transformed objects into something magical. For a moment, I pretended to be driving to some other place between the worlds where an ordinary commute could take me somewhere beneath all of this normal living.

I am free today at least until late afternoon,which is a very good thing since some rather bad events happened at work last week. I dread going back and I do not have to today!!!

HA! Thank you ice and snow.

ice

There may come a time
When you'll be tired
As tired as a dream that wants to die
And further to fly
Further to fly
Further to fly
Further to fly

Maybe you will find a love
That you discover accidentally
Who falls against you gently
As a pickpocket
Brushes your thigh
Further to fly


-Paul Simon --Further to Fly

Pilgrim
Where’s your head at?
Are you paying the birds to sing?
Meet me
On the true path
I’ll be dizzy from growing wings


-Sarah Slean- Pilgrim

And he sang of the wondrous far-off places
That a man may only see in dreams,
The death-still, odorous, starlit spaces
where Time is lost and no life gleams.

And there till the day had its crest uplifted,
He stood with his still face bent on me,
Then forth with the Dawn departing drifted
Light as a foam-fleck on the sea.

And now my heart is the heart of a swallow
That here no solace of rest may find,
Forevermore I follow and follow
His white feet glancing down the wind.

And forevermore in my ears are ringing--
(Oh, red lips yet shall I kiss you dumb!)
Twain sole words of that May morn's singing,
Calling to me "Hither"! and "Come"!

From flower-bright fields to the wild lake-sedges
Crying my steps when Day has gone,
Till dim and small down the Night's pale edges
The stars have fluttered one by one.

-The Dream of Aengus Og by Eleanor Rogers Cox
(with a slight change in text from she to he)

They will complain of physical hardship, these sons of the pioneers. Not for long; once they rediscover the pleasures of actually operating their own limbs and senses in a varied, spontaneous, voluntary style, they will complain instead of crawling back into a car; they may even object to returning to a desk and office and that dry wall box on Mossy Brook Circle. The fires of revolt may be kindled-which means hope for us all.

-Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey

I couldn't resist posting on the giant banana
I find meaning in the lavish amount of money used to fund such a noble artistic venture. Perhaps I will write a grant to fly a giant cucumber over Canada.

The term NOTAN, a Japanese word meaning "dark, light", refers to the quantity of light reflected, or the massing of tones of different values. Notan-beauty means the harmony resulting from the combination of dark and light spaces-

-Arthur Wesley Dow - Composition
(sigh:-)

Something fishy...

Of all the souls to meet why these two?
One, old and dark, furious as a shrugging ocean.
The other, shiny, fresh as a winter morning.
Of all the souls to meet why these two?

-Why This One? Cowboy Junkies

Woodstork vs. camera

this is why you should sit on the higher part of the tree, otherwise...

Selkie

Painting all day is similar to lying in bed with a lover. You are seduced and unwilling to leave the warm, comfortable space but are forced to for the necessities of nature. It is intoxicating and absorbs me completely. The day passes and I don't seem to notice the time. Suddenly it is dark outside and my body is tired. I knew I had to quit when I dropped my palette. Luckily it fell paint side up. Tomorrow will likely bring the subtle bitterness of an impending work week, that will take my time away from my passion. I will dream all week of working on it again as if I am indeed giddy with a crush.

I will have the amazing luxury of painting all day today. I have been waiting weeks for this and hopefully it will be a day of accomplishment. So without further delay...I go...

Megaceryle Alcyon

He dropped from the branch, called, winged downriver, his image doubled in the water. He heard the call again, closer now. If she returned, he'd dive into the river, greet her with a fish, fly around her, feed her beak to beak... He pumped his wings harder now. He heard the cackle closer, louder, more insistent. He recognized her voice. She was hurling her way upriver.

Any moment now: she'd fly into his vision.

-from Birds in Fall by Brad Kessler

Leapin' Limpkin

some bad choices made by a hospital regarding art here

and I was going to market my pussycats playing bridge picture to hospitals, damn.

Words

I had this thought a while ago,
‘My darling cannot understand
What I have done, or what would do
In this blind bitter land.’

And I grew weary of the sun
Until my thoughts cleared up again,
Remembering that the best I have done
Was done to make it plain;

That every year I have cried, ‘At length
My darling understands it all,
Because I have come into my strength,
And words obey my call’;

That had he done so who can say
What would have shaken from the sieve?
I might have thrown poor words away
And been content to live.

-William Butler Yeats

Brown Pelican

I love the way pelicans fly. They fly effortlessly for their size. It almost seems as though they are sitting back in an easy chair on the air.

Unfortunately they are having trouble with the red tide

Happy New Year

May you have a year of peaceful co-existence, or
a year of knowing you have a tough enough shell to take some chances.