haiku

life’s passages … 103

over the fields of

last night’s snow–

plum fragrance.

                                                                                      ~Okano Kin’emon Kanehide*

plums and raindrops
a spring rain shower

*cited:

Japanese Death Poems

Yoel Hoffmann

 

life passages … 99

Is my mind elsewhere

Or has it simply not sung?

Hototogisu*

~Ihara Saikaku (1642-1693)**

*Hototogisu, translated as cuckoo, wood thrush and sometimes nightingale.

The bird’s song is a strong but mournful cry.

It is said to die after singing 8,008 times.

It is also known as the “bird of time,”

“messenger of death” and “bird of disappointed love,”

and flies back and forth from this world to the next.

Confucian axiom: If one’s mind is elsewhere, one will look but not see, listen but not hear

**cited in:

The Classic Tradition of Haiku

Edited by:  Faubion Bowers

lens-artists: music to my eyes

The child claps his hands

playing alone, happily,

under a festive tree ~Issa*

artist: R. B. AH**
artist: A. H-A**

Egidio invites photographers to share photographs that are associated with songs. That is, “what music do you hear in your photos?”

I thought to share this masterpiece of abstract art created by a very quiet and thoughtful artist.

While photographs do not bring to mind music, they often speak to me either through haiku or a haiku accompanies me during a photo walk. There are associations with images and scent as well as music and memory.

Music seems more abstract than other art forms because it represents emotional states, symmetry and repetition, and other intangibles. But just because you can’t see or touch these things, doesn’t make them any less real. In preliterate societies, music was probably one of the best methods for storing and conveying complex stories and information.***

One of the best ways to understand how the over-all space of creative expression reflects its parts is to imagine yourself inside the space of the artwork…select a place within the composition where you would like to locate yourself for a few minutes of contemplation. …imagine…passing through different areas of the artwork…feel…energetic patterns. (152)****

*cited: The Spring of My life

Trans: Sam Hamill

**used with permission by the artist

***The Ethan Hein Blog (www.ethanhein,com)

**** McNiff, Shawn

Trust the Process

lens-artists: people here, there & everywhere

People … communicating through their silence … speaking through through their nonverbal actions

Issa speaking through time through his poetry:

people are people
I am me…
in my cool house ~Issa*

Travels and Trifles’ lens-artists challenge: people here, there, and everywhere

*cited: http://www.haikuguy.com

lens-artists: circles

There was a time when the words an instructor interrupted my wondering mind, “there is no perfect justice and, then later, no perfect circle.” Again, a world view punctured.

Photo challenges that encourage a photo walk in search of a particular color (red is an easy color as it is often used within advertisement) or a particular composition element in photography are heaps of fun.

Circles, I find, are like the color red…they are everywhere.

street

circled by a hedge
of wild roses…
mountain home ~Issa (www.haikuguy.com)

Thank you Leya for this invitation to open my eyes to the world of circles.