blueskydeep [Explored] - a photo on Flickriver

            This time it’s a sliver of light, a headlight blooming blue through the bottom of the doorframe, bouncing off glass and catching on the starry brownness of my inner eyelids.
The other night it was a yip, coyote probably, over near the singular prick of light down near the right hand corner of Sharptop’s pyramid. I get up and bash around in the kitchen, gnawing on a banana and pouring myself half a glass of orange juice. Tonight I guess I’ll hang out with Thomas Merton in Alaska, resolving to keep a better journal myself, admiring the brisk energy of his wry hungry punches of haiku. When I was ten I couldn’t sleep one April night and lay on the rollaway bed out on the screen porch, watching the horses’ shadows rub their shedding spring haunches against the gate, hearing the first tags of cricketvoice in the woods. Another time in winter I lay on the parquet floor of the living room and warmed into the pop of the melting logbark as the night’s fire died. I was sad and the blue window-triangle of constellations holding onto the big old ceiling beams up above me made me sadder. I pushed through the sorrow and named the pricks of star, lining them up into sunburned shoulders and deer rifles, fallen oak leaves and chimneys spumed with smoke, horses’ newly combed manes and the frayed edges of patchwork quilts. This became a habit over the years when the puddle of blanket and pillow would send me into other rooms just to be in a different space. Sometimes I have the same formations of planet and distant sun in my head for years but then it feels like it’s time for something else. Right now I have an old rusted out hoe I found in a corner of a shed, a stray hound dog’s notched ear, the furl of a koi fin I saw in my father’s pond, the silhouette of the checkout lady at the Piggly Wiggly who also works at the elementary school caferia, and a teapot shaped like most of a diminishing moon. These trails and squares, spikes and circles, pentagrams and blips fall me asleep when I can’t get there alone. They have their stories, or sometimes just the start or the middle of a story. Seldom just the end. I let them hold onto my pettiness, the trembling earnest giddiness I find it hard to share, my still sometimes unutterable grief, my remorse, and my whispers. I won’t tell you the names behind the shapes. They aren’t secrets but they’re spelled and said in a language you have to come to know yourself: a lexicon not of invention but of remembrance.

--laura sorrells
© 2010 all rights reserved

Taken on: February 11, 2010

Tags:

Blue

my poetry

painterly

prose poem

winter

snow

nostalgia

childhood

sky

dark

comfort

creativity

mystery

lexicon

alphabet

wordplay

constellation

bittersweet

cold

home

snowbound

storm

snowstorm

the Cove

favorite

possible card choice

Monday Vigils

Explored

paradox

joy

sleeplessness

awakening

language

insomnia

change

liminality

threshold

grace

love « less

Sets appears in: • repetition and patterns • landscapes more » • my favorite things • most interesting • images and words together • at the Cove • 2010 • favorites • blessings and prayers • 2K plus views • cool tones • memorable days • Visio divina possibilities • the wheel of the year • over 10,000 views • solitude • gift and card choices and some personal faves • for shows? • silence • via negativa • agents of healing and comfort • 3,000 views or more • taken at night • grace • mystical • contemplative • snow and ice • over 500 views • A Book of Hours • 50 plus favorites • the wild wood • weather • over 5,000 views • celestial • over 1,000 views • colorplay • whimsical • holiday card choices • Explored • thin places • joy • the spirit of the season • sky • magical and otherworldly • nourishment for the soul • winter • vivid, deep, vibrant colors and hues • psychedelic stuff • dreamlike • blues • trees • Woods and forest • moody « less

Groups appears in: • Winter Wonderland • Artistic Photography more » • bliss • Photographic Art • Photographic Impressionism Post 1 / Award 1 • Melancholy • Hush • the skies above • My Everyday Life • Epiphany, epiphany • Georgia Photographers • Everyday Photography • Ethereal • Welcome To My World (WTMW) • Memory and Desire • Georgia On My Mind • Natural Mystic • Your Best Photography • Soulful & poetic • Franciscan Spirituality • Georgia Canon Photographers • ~Good Mojo~ • as beautiful as you want • ~ Serene ~Post only when you got time to comment on other photos • The American South • Primeval Forests • BRAVO 55555 [P1-C2] • TRES CHIC • pf: Primeval Winter « less

Camera: Canon PowerShot SD780 IS, f/3.2, 1/60 sec, 5.9mm, ISO 400 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Canon PowerShot SD780 IS
Aperture:	f/3.2
Exposure Time:	0.017 sec (1/60)
Focal Length:	5.9mm
ISO:	400
Exposure Bias:	0 EV
Flash:	On, Red-eye reduction
Exposure Mode:	Auto
Metering Mode:	Multi-segment
White Balance:	Auto
Color Space:	sRGB
Software:	Microsoft Windows Photo Gallery 6.0.6000.16386
Show full info

Stats: 19,498 views / 24 comments

Link to this photo view:
Link to this photo large view: