71 Floral Study no. 2

70 Crop Circle

69 Floral Study

68 Brainstorm

67 Passage

Once we stood

Strong on that bright pier,

The winds our cry

The waves our song

The stars our hope.

The touch of your hand,

Rebellious and strong,

Soft and supple,

A bulwark against

The hours’ passage.

Now pale, now

Chafed,

Your gentle

Fingers swell

And gnarl like

Aged branches.

The veins,

Rising against

The transparent

Flesh,

Pulse with trepid

Temperament.

My eyes search

The unsteady shore,

Brine sticking

To flesh and hair.

By the changing

And eternal moon

I fly alone.

"Passage" from At The Edge

66 Globes no.3

65 Transparent Solution

64 Stonework

63 A Narrow View

62 Birds Gone Bad no.3 (A Photographer's Nightmare)

61 Disturbance no.2

60 Van Gogh

Do you remember

A summer day 

At the Van Gogh

Exhibit; we refused the

Portable Tour Guide,

We would provide our own

Narrative, we would make

Van Gogh our own,

And anyone’s who would

Listen. On that day

We were the V.G. experts,

Connoiseurs of the form.

On that day

We defined the ego

Of V.G., the coloring

Of the wheat fields,

The coloring of the beard,

The hair, no small

Coincidence.

On that day, the World

Became Van Gogh

And V.G. the World.

Of Starry Night,

We described the halos

In the vision

Of a madman,

Of  his self-portraits

We described

The painful gaze,

The heavy brow,

And the weight of

His oppression.

And yes, we

Described the

Alcohol-tinged yellows

Of his vision.

And oh, the World

In the end observed by,

And oh, the World

In the end consumed by

And oh, Van Gogh

On the last day –

Alone in

A wheat field

Set upon by crows,

A wheat field

Overcome

By Blackness

A wheat field,

And beard, and tousled

Hair

Consumed into Spirit.

And that painting

Loomed high

In the Gallery’s

Last chamber.

And many dropped

Low their portable

tour guides

To listen to my

Last time with you.

Blackness comes

Winged across the

Wheat field;

Blackness comes.

59 At the Edge

At the edge of my Spirit my sister sits

Her dancing eyes like chocolate moons

Among the clouds that form her face.

Her flop-eared bunny clutched in hand

Linty, gray and worn, his name is Lapin.

Wrapped in blankets and at the edge of Sleep,

I can see the teacups she prepares for tea,

Talking as she pours - to Raggedy Anne, Lapin and me.

And where is the little girl that I once knew

She has gone so far away.

When I walk the woods in which we played,

And hear the brook near which we stayed

I know she’s there with her pet Lapin,

My dearest sister, my favorite friend.

"At the Edge" title piece from At the Edge

Brought out of the archives as a result of  S. Gibb's profound depiction of loss in  her piece entitled Individual

58 1/2 Oh Hell Revealed

 For anyone interested in the mechanics for creating Oh Hell, here is a quick recap in the stages (using Photoshop CS5)

Original photo (top left) innocently shot by my brother Dan
copy original photo and reverse it, add layer mask and create fading gradient to allow left half of original layer display (top right)
Add Gradient Map layer, using orange to black gradient (lower left)
Add Levels Adjustment layer for deeper color (lower right)

58 Oh Hell

57 When the Heavens Reflect

56 Pave Paradise

55 Pismo Beach Underworld

54 Washed Up

53 Some of Us Look Away

Listen to me, he says, ya gotta hang that storm wave and bite hard into the sand when ya hit.

The old sailor's grunt is weak today, no doubt that ancient shell begins to crack on some primeval stone, the guts of his home ready to spill like wave-froth against the shore.

I tell ya, ain't nothin' to it, not near as tough as the gale of '64.

We order another drink as he coughs the lingering notes of his life upon the barroom floor.

When he spits up, some of us look away.

"Some of Us Look Away" from "The Collection"

52 Troubled Descent

51 There's a Monster in my Soup

There’s a Monster in my soup, and he won’t let go my spoon,

Mom, you have to help me, he’s reaching for my hand.

He’s got great big hairy ears, and a horrid toothy grin

He’s looking at me funny, and his head can really spin.

His eyes are big as saucers, his claws like silver knives

I’m sure he’d like to eat me; I’m ready if he tries.

He’s telling me come closer, to hear what he has to say,

His eyes are rolling backwards, his feet are shaking dry,

He’s walking on the table, and he’s coming right this way.

I’m taking out my play doh, in case he wants to play.

I’m making a bigger monster, just like you showed me how,

So Monster, don’t come nearer, I’m ready for you now.

"There's a Monster in My Soup" from At the Edge

Thanks to the anonymous child who drew the  Soup Monster so many years ago, and to Susan Gibb, for reminding me that Monsters are still out there.

50 Spectral Pony

Inspired by Jill's Chesterfield series

49 The Cube Unplugged no.2

48 The Bride Doll Finds a Husband

In a small village a bride doll tires of living by herself.  I will go out and find a husband, she says, and that very day she sets out to find him.

After passing through several towns she at last comes upon a curious doll shop managed by an even more curious shopkeeper doll.  I am looking for a husband, says the bride doll.  The shopkeeper does not speak but he motions the bride doll to a nearby rack.

The bride doll feels sorry for a man doll whose plastic eyes have fallen out.  I will take this one and fix him, she says to the shopkeeper, who frowns but says nothing.

Many months pass after the bride doll has fixed her husband's eyes and one day she says to him, I think it is time for us to have children.  The husband doll picks her up and locks her in the icebox.  When at last he opens the door, the bride doll smiles weakly and gives him a hug.

When she decides again to ask her husband about making children, the husband doll ties her in a box until morning.  And as often as she repeats her request, he responds in a similar fashion, but the bride doll never complains.

A day comes when the bride doll hears a knock against a closet door.  When she opens the door, she is surprised to find that the shopkeeper doll she had met years earlier is tied up.  What are you doing here? she asks.  The shopkeeper doll does not reply, and the bride doll shuts the door again.

When her husband is home from work, she says, husband, there is a man in our closet.

His children are dead, he answers.  I have shut him in our closet so he cannot hear them scream.

That very night, the bride doll helps her husband with his bath.  She runs the water and begins to clean him.  She holds his head under to rinse his hair.  As he smiles at her from beneath the water she continues to rinse his hair.  The bride doll begins to hear the cries of children, and she hears them long after the doll bubbles no longer surface.

When at last she looks to her husband, she sees that he has become the strange shopkeeper doll, and she begins at that moment to feel her bride doll body welling up with child.

  

"The Bride Doll Finds a Husband" from The Collection  

Inspired by Susan Gibb's Equality