I consider myself a nature photographer, including wild landscapes, wildlife, and plants. In town, I particularly enjoy birds and one of my favorite birds is the American Robin. Here are a couple shots plus links to more.
Few birds relish a bath the way robins do. I’ve seen them slosh water out of the bath with their joyous flitting, take off, then return for more. One time we had 4 robins at the bath at once.
From my book, Nasal Gazing.
Speaking of me, you may have noticed my twin interests: photography and poetry. I think of them separately, but both are creative expressions or the Universe talking back to itself visually versus verbally. I hesitate to bring the two together in the most obvious way, which would be to associate a poem and a photo. Foremost, there is "the thing not named," a concept I get from Willa Cather, although it is older and widely practiced. I have felt that if one *needed* to explain a poem, something went wrong (possibly in the reader’s head, not mine). The urge to explain is strong in me and all of my poems arise in a context that I could document and my 3 readers might even enjoy that.
I’m certain a poem and a photo could work together, but I’m reluctant to yoke the two together, to require you to see what I see in a poem or hear what I hear in a photo. I don’t even want to do that to myself, let alone to you, Dear Reader.
However, some things go together like [insert one thing] and [insert something that goes with that]. For example,
Of course, over a period of 30 years, I’ve taken a lot of photos of Merri, any one of which might work as well here. And, she figures into more than one poem. But these two are a good fit, you have to admit.
Likewise, the pairing of my preaching raven with Wind Makes Crazy.
Poetry and photography are always on my mind, but in particular, I’ve wanted for quite a while to produce a book of either or both. Maybe someday.
And I thought New Zealand is such a cool country. Imagine requiring government permission for a name? Granted, anyone who names their kid * or /.. is just asking for trouble, but let them do it. peace, mark JUSTICE hinton [a tip of the bowler to StEvE Lucifer 0^Neill+.]
New Zealand’s List of Banned Baby Names Gets Updated | TIME.com By Erica Ho May 02, 2013
The name Justice was rejected the most — a whopping 62 times, CNN reports. …
Eight parents wanted to insert backslashes into their children’s first names, while four wanted to put brackets around their middle names. Not to mention that the government has already rejected Lucifer at least six times.
Read more: http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/05/02/new-zealand-updates-banned-baby-names-list/#ixzz2SXBumflp
New Zealand’s List of Banned Baby Names Gets Updated | TIME.com
And a nod to John Fleck, whose birthday I appropriated inadvertently.
Hey, if I can’t be self-indulgent on my own blog, where can I? In May of 2010, I aspired to post a photography-related item every day. I called the project Photomayo, even if that only means something to me. I stumbled almost immediately that year, but have attempted to do better since. Today, I’m declaring Cinco de Photomayo and inviting you to explore any (or all — hah!) of these topics from prior years:
Please come back to see what happens next. peace, mjh