The grass does not refuse
To flourish in the spring wind;
The leaves are not angry
At falling through the autumn sky.
Who with whip or spur
Can urge the feet of Time?
The things of the world flourish and decay,
Each at its own hour. ~Li Po (cited: Trans: A Waley & B Li, The Poet Li Po. Project Gutenberg Ebook)
A song out there… Why, it is a beggar singing! If this old man who never had a silver coin can sing, why must you with rich gold memories sit here and sigh?
~Tu Fu (cited: The Jade Flute: Chinese Poems in Prose, gutenberg.org)
This week scillagrace invites us to share Getting To Know You photographs that show our relationship with a subject that generated our attention, won our affection and taught us a thing or two.
on a makeshift bridge
we make friends…
croaking frog ~Issa (cited www.haikuguy.com)
I enjoy photo walk abouts…it is as if a camera has a third eye that invites me to look/see. Over time, I’ve enjoyed expanding my efforts to include using double exposure, long exposure, window reflections in street photography.
Introducing body language as a way to introduce emotions within street photography.
Exploring window reflections as a means to compose a frame within a frame as well as create an abstract street image.
Accepting the challenge of in-camera double exposure.
And…may I invite you to spend a few minutes watching a mom and child, getting to know each other through laughter and validation. I know you will find yourself smiling.
Bebê italiano aprendendo a falar
if I go to heaven I will forget you,
and
if I go to hell you will forget me.*
In China a person who will not forget the past is described as ‘one who did not drink Old Lady Meng’s soup.’ Borrowed from Buddhist folklore, Old Lady Meng dispenses the Broth of Oblivion to souls leaving the last realm of the underworld on their way to reincarnation. After drinking her soup, the soul is directed to the Bridge of Pain that spans a river of crimson water. There, two demons lie in wait: Life-Is-Not-Long and Death-is-Near. They hurl the soul into waters that will lead to new births.
Old Lady Meng is more than a quaint antidote for the Greeks’ Mnemosyne. She embodies a psychological understanding about the forces that promote, indeed demand, forgetting for the sake of ongoing life. It is not enough to note that water is linked with amnesia in Chinese folklore as much the same way that the river Lethe is associated with forgetting in Greek mythology. The challenge here is to make sense of the distinctively Chinese attachment to remembrance in spite of the benefits of Old Lady Meng’s soul.
In Jewish tradition, too, the benefits of amnesia were acknowledged along with the sacred commitment to recollection. There is a midrash, or Torah-based story, that teaches us a lesson similar to that of Lady Meng: ‘God granted Adam and Eve an all-important blessing as they were about to leave the Garden of Eden: I give you, He said, ‘the gift of forgetfulness.” What is so precious about amnesia? Why would God, who demands fidelity to memory, offer the relief from recollection?Perhaps it is because without some ability to forgive and forget we might become bound by grudges and hatred. To remember everything may be immobilizing. To flee from memory, however, leads to an ever more debilitating frenzy.(40-41)**
source:
*Arang and the Magistrate
Munhwa broadcasting corporation
**Bridge Across Broken Time
Vera Schwarcz
Initially posted on October 10, 2013
As the ink flows onto the page,
each word creating and tumbling into another,
she wonders aloud to no one in particular,
“are these sleeping memories
left in the shadows of grief …
a past writing on and on
this tale and that …
moving my pen across the page …
as if a bridge to yesterday?”
my face – my mother’s
lingering scent of sweet peas
mirrored reunion.
meandering tales
beyond a haze of tear drops
my mother’s face – mine.
faded looking glass
a cup or two of coffee,
“Let’s linger a bit.”
“Yes, a line is fine, but when a line swerves, when a line bends, watch what happens . . . a shape begins!…
“A square is four sides all the same — … blocks to build with, share and stack…
“A rectangle is like a square with something rearranged. Two sides are long and two are short. …
“A circle’s … the bowl Mom fills with hot noddle soup, … a cookie to eat, … a big drum to beat, bicycle wheels …
“A triangle is three — three sides, three corners too … the pyramids of old, a lunch of jam and bread, a napkin to fold …
“An oval’s like a circle, except it’s not …” (cited: R G Greene, When a Line Bends . . . a Shape Begins)
Join Patti’s (P.A. Moed) Lens-Artists challenge — to share shapes that are visually interesting and form a pattern or rhythm.
For the month of March, Paula (Lost in Translation) invites us to share images that illustrate one of five words – buffet, equine, gleaming, jagged, and lacustrine – within photos or photos that reflect each of the words.
I chose lacustrine which Merriam-Webster defines as: relating to, formed in, living in, or growing in lakes. The Roget’s International Thesaurus identifies lacustrine as: lake dweller, pile dweller or builder, laker.
Beginning with a poem written by Li Po:
The harvest moon is burning the waters of South Lake. Driving alone, I lean down to pick white lotus lilies.
Fierce desire pulls me… I yearn to tell them of my passion. Alas, my boat floats away at mercy of the moving current. My heart looks back in sadness.
~Li Po (cited: Trans: Anonymous. The Jade Flute. The Gutenberg Project)
And then a sharing of more music by Christine and the Queens…
May your spring be filled with days of laughter, pastel colors, awakening, family, friends, wellness, and hope.
smudge-ing sky, dove gray
painting brush, white dipped – dripping
Snowflake by snowflake
“…each moment gives rise to the next, this is because that is. We do not exist in isolation; there is nothing that exist by itself alone.” (cited: Brother Phap Hai, Nothing to it.
On a pitch-dark
night road
I get lost
watching the moon
set behind the faraway mountain. Ryokan (cited: Trans. K Tanahashi, Sky Above, Great Wind)
Clouds drifting off:
the sight of
moonlit heavens ~Kizan (cited: Trans. Y. Hoffman, Japanese Death Poems)
Even more
because of being alone
the moon is a friend ~Buson (cited: Trans: Y Sawa & E M Shiffert, Haiku Master Buson)
This week’s lens-artists photo challenge is hosted by Tina (Travels and Trifles) who invites us to share some of those special moments that have taken our breath away.
be safe, be well, and be sage.
Glossy branches of jasper, A sprinkling of early blossoms, Touched up by snow bring, The first tidings of spring. Soft and delicate in her new make-up, Fragrant face half showing, She emerges in the middle of the courtyard-- A beauty in the flower of youth fresh from her bath.
Nature must have regarded her with special favor, To lavish on her such splendid moonbeams. Come drain these golden cups of emerald Till we are drunk. Of all flowers this the one beyond compare. ~Li Qingzhao (cited: Jiaosheng Wang, Sino-Plantonic Papers The Complete Ci-poems of Li Qingzhao: A New English Translation)
Like the morning moon,
Cold, unpitying was my love.
And since we parted,
I dislike nothing so much
As the breaking light of day. ~Mibu no Tadamine
In the peaceful light
Of the ever-shining sun
In the days of spring,
Why do the cherry’s new-blown blooms
Scatter like restless thoughts? ~Ki no Tomonori
This week Amy invites photographers to share their work using natural light.
a meditative journey 
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