"Art is not a pastime but a priesthood."
...Jean Cocteau

©Joyce Meyer 2008

Alone
holding a rock
I cracked caps on cement.

Alone
reading ‘No Trespassing’ sign
on barbed wire fence
where land mines and bombs
were hidden.

Alone
worrying about when the red
button would be pushed and I
would smell skin burning
like Hiroshima.

Alone
I heard the last
gasp of breath Dad took.

“See how nature----trees, flowers, grass---grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence. We need silence to be able to touch souls.”
…. Mother Teresa

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow."
...Melody Beattie

Haiku Moment #18
Autumn
hand-written letter, forever stamp
cried sitting in red grass.

My intuition said, "Shoot this." And so I did. The image was filled with chaos. Patterns, forms, color shouted from every corner of the picture. Look at me! Look at me! I felt overwhelmed with what existed. I focused on one thing and changed the color image to sepia. And out of this action came unadorned beauty.

Unadorned Beauty

This shot was taken in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, May, 2008. I saw this lonely dead tree standing there among trees of every green color in the universe. Friday, I was looking at old files and wondered delete or keep this tree image. Perhaps if I worked with the picture, the ordinary could become extraordinary. So the process began. I cropped out everything, but the tree. Then I changed it from color to sepia. I didn’t think it popped enough. So, then I tried using different colors for a background and discovered that now it had the desired effect. Here is the finished result.

I focused my attention on this flower
by letting go of background noises
like traffic, birds calling to one another,
and just movement of leaves in the wind.
Lesson relearned: Seeing the darkness,
brings out the light.

Author Sam Hamill wrote, “His [Bashō] fundamental teaching remained his conviction that in composing a poem, there are two ways:” ‘one is entirely natural, in which the poem is born from within itself; the other way is to make it through the mastery of technique.'
Mr. Hamill wrote, “ His notion of the poem being ‘born within itself’ should under no circumstances be confused with its being self-originating. A fundamental tenet of Buddhism runs exactly to the contrary: nothing is self-originating. Bashō poems were in fact a natural product of his close observation of the natural relationships of people and things, our presence in ‘nature’.”
THE ESSENTIAL BASHŌ Translated by Sam Hamill, SHAMBHALA, Boston, © 1999, pages 176-177.

When this shot was taken, I was not in a hurry.
I needed to stay there and let time pass.
Purpose was to study this rose. To actually see
the color and the raindrops clinging to each petal.
I wanted to immerse myself in that moment.

"Nobody sees a flower, really---it is so
small---we haven't time, and to see takes
time, like to have a friend takes time."
....Georgia O'Keeffe.

"And if there is anyone who has no wish,
he should not stay in the world, he
should avoid the crowd as he cannot
exist there; he should go into the
mountains, and even there he should
turn into a tree or a rock in order to
exist, because to be a living being without
a wish is not possible."
...Hazrat Khan

Rider has no face. Horse has no tail. Reposted image,
taken at Epcot, Walt Disney World.

View from the Window at Le Gras, Nicéphore Niépce, in 1826. Public Domain.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:View from_the_Window_at_Le_Gras,_Joseph_Nicéphore_Niépce.jpg#filehistory

Today, I was looking up the word bitumen.
One word, lead me to discover that
Joseph Nicéphore Niépce took the first photograph:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Nicéphore_Niépce.
The plate, VIEW FROM THE WINDOW
AT LE GRAS, can be viewed at
Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center,
University of Texas, Austin.
Just requested book LIFE: 100 Photographs
That Changed The World from the
library. I can hardly wait to see it.
Research is my passion, it never ends.

Rider has no face, horse now has tail.
Image taken at Epcot, Walt Disney World

"Leaves no trace, like fresh snow."
...I Ching

Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow!
Surprise, when we went out for dinner
last night, the backyard looked
like powdered sugar was tossed
everywhere. I can't believe it;
snow before Thanksgiving. Very
unusual.

Haiku Moment #17
Pressed flowers
wedding bouquet in Bible
our memory.

Haiku Moment #16
Owl with hooded eyes
amid the steaming mist hollows
rush of air.

"A pessimist sees only the dark side
of the clouds, and mopes;
a philosopher sees both sides, and shrugs;
an optimist doesn't see the clouds
at all--he's walking on them."
...Leonard Louis Levinson

This is a corrected Photo.

Barn Shots
I like exploring shapes this time with old posts and wood, vertical and horizontal lines, reflections in windows, and roofing material. First shot, took out one window. Second shot, took out two windows. Third shot, was the whole picture of a barn. Fourth shot was not taken because I didn't want to include the house, the acreage or the sky into the image. Why is that? My focus is to see things as simple as possible. I wanted to show conflict in the shots with the use of vertical and horizontal lines and how light falls on object. Was this accomplished? Yes. These could have been wow shots through better use of light.

Haiku Moment #15
Summer morning
fog down the peninsula road
envelopes the bay.

“Follow nature, return to nature, be nature.”
…Bashō: Oku-no-hosomichi

“Yesterday’s self is already worn out!”
…Bashō: Oku-no-hosomichi

Haiku Moment #14
Early morning sun
leaves which turned golden brown
magical hour.

Haiku Moment #13
Daddy long legs spider
tight rope walking
on dry curly leaves.

Haiku Moment #12
Smokey mountains
sheets hanging on clothesline
first kiss.

No More Calico Hats

The father stands
looking across the bricks toward the misty gully
for a split second each forgets the other.
They dream of yesterday.
Grandmother smiles.

She wears a handmade flour sack apron
with beans piled high as a cat’s back.
A beagle sleeps on the front porch
next to her.
Grandmother smiles.

She wears a calico hat
protecting her face from the hot sun.
Eyes like purple pansies growing in a spring garden,
she leans back in a rocker remembering dad as a boy.
Grandmother smiles.

September she faces what we all do, alone.
Is it dark and cold or is light and warm?
Her last earthly vision was of sleeping under a beech tree.
She is gone to meet her ancestors.
Grandmother smiles.

©Joyce Meyer, 11/07/2008

"Outdoor light that has been architecturalized and rendered abstract by the opening in the wall imparts tension to the space and makes it sacred."
...Tadao Ando
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tadao_Ando
see also this site:
Photographs by Sanghyun Lee
Church On The Water To The Church Of The Light
http://www.andotadao.org/
Scroll down to Church Of The Light
FYI: I did not download another language; just clicked on X to close box.

Note to Self:
Light+Water+Sky=Abstract
Light+Shadows+Objects+Space+Form=Sacred Space

Image was taken at Epcot, Walt Disney World, Orlando, Florida.

"The moon and sun are eternal travelers. Even the years wander on. A lifetime adrift in a boat or in old age leading a tired horse into the years, every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home."
...Bashō: Oku-no-hosomichi

Haiku Moment #11
"Bees, bees and more bees
budding sunflower field
embraced by shadows."

Here is information on why we vote on Tuesday, in November: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/ynews_pl126

"Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes."
...Mahatma Gandhi

My watch says 12:38 p.m. My "puter" says 11:38 a.m. Did you turn your clocks back yet? I need to spend some time today setting clocks back. Does anyone know what time it is? Half passed a freckle. Sun is full center in the sky, must be noon.

Haiku Moment #10
"Grandfather Grandmother
hear horse hoofs and howling
past shadows."

Haiku Moment #9
"Spring fed lake
saucer-shaped lotus blossoms
relief in the stillness."

Haiku Moment #8
"Lemonade
wooden apple crate scooter
10 cents a glass."