Happy Poinsettia Day!

Posted by Maverick ~ on December 12, 2014
Posted in: Flowers, Photography. Tagged: , , .

20141207-IMG_0104
“Percy, the puny poinsettia is hanging his bloom in dismay.
If they had just kept him wetta, he’d be a houseplant today.”  –  Percy, the Puny Poinsettia

 

“In Mexico the plant is called La Flor de la Nochebuena or, Flower of the Holy Night and is displayed in celebration of December 12th, Dia de la Virgen. Use of the plant to celebrate Christmas in Mexico dates back to the 17th century. The flower connects to the legend of a young girl, distraught about not having anything with which to honor the Baby Jesus in a Christmas Procession. An angel tells her that any gift given with love is a wonderful gift. Later the weeds she gathers by the roadside to place around the manger miraculously transform into the beautiful red star flower we think of as Poinsettia.” —  Happy Poinsettia Day!

Paths ~

Posted by Maverick ~ on December 11, 2014
Posted in: Inspiration, Photography. Tagged: , .

20141122-IMG_0150-Edit-Edit-Edit

“All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. . . . They are paths going through
the bush, or into the bush. In my own life I could say I have traversed long,
long paths but I am not anywhere. My benefactor’s question has meaning now.
Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn’t it is of
no use. Both paths lead nowhere; but one has a heart, the other doesn’t. One
makes for a joyful journey; as long as you follow it, you are one with it. The
other will make you curse your life. One makes you strong; the other weakens you.”

Carlos Castaneda

Knot to be ~

Posted by Maverick ~ on December 9, 2014
Posted in: Monochrome Madness, Photography. Tagged: .

Knot to be ~
“I think all art is about control – the encounter between control and the uncontrollable.”
— Richard Avedon

Knot to be to be on Leanne Cole’s blog later today for Leanne and Laura Macky’s Monochrome Madness extravaganza. If you’re not tied up, do stop by and view this week’s monochrome entries contributed by an exceptionally talented international consortium of artists and photographers.

☾ ☀ ☽

Monochrome Madness – Week XXXXI

From a Railway Carriage ~

Posted by Maverick ~ on December 8, 2014
Posted in: Photography, Poetry. Tagged: , , .

20141109-IMG_0691-Edit-Edit-Edit-Edit-Edit-Edit-Edit

“Faster than fairies, faster than witches,
Bridges and houses, hedges and ditches;
And charging along like troops in a battle
All through the meadows the horses and cattle:
All of the sights of the hill and the plain
Fly as thick as driving rain;
And ever again, in the wink of an eye,
Painted stations whistle by.
Here is a child who clambers and scrambles,
All by himself and gathering brambles;
Here is a tramp who stands and gazes;
And here is the green for stringing the daisies!
Here is a cart runaway in the road
Lumping along with man and load;
And here is a mill, and there is a river:
Each a glimpse and gone forever!”

Robert Louis Stevenson

WPC: Gone, But Not Forgotten

Posted by Maverick ~ on December 6, 2014
Posted in: Photography, Weekly Photo Challenge. Tagged: , , , .

20140906-IMG_0267-Edit-Edit
Summertime blues.  “Blue light is scattered in all directions by the tiny molecules of air in Earth’s atmosphere. Blue is scattered more than other colors because it travels as shorter, smaller waves. This is why we see a blue sky most of the time.” NASA  * Scala & Kolacny –  California Dreamin’

20140831-IMG_0996-Edit
Ain’t no cure for the summertime blues except maybe summer’s cool green turquoise waters.
The Apache believe turquoise filled the pot at the end of the rainbow.  – Turquoise meanings.

Weekly Photo Challenge:  Gone, But Not Forgotten

On Darkness ~

Posted by Maverick ~ on December 5, 2014
Posted in: Photography, Poetry. Tagged: , , , , .

20141129-IMG_0282-Edit-2-2

 On Darkness, – Rainer Maria Rilke

“You darkness, that I come from,
I love you more than all the fires
that fence in the world,
for the fire makes
a circle of light for everyone,
and then no one outside learns of you.

But the darkness pulls in everything;
shapes and fires, animals and myself,
how easily it gathers them!—
powers and people—
and it is possible a great energy
is moving near me.
I have faith in nights.”

Carol of the Bells – Nox Arcana

Seven geese a swimming…

Posted by Maverick ~ on December 3, 2014
Posted in: Nature, Photography, Poetry. Tagged: , , .

20141130-IMG_0179-Edit

WILD GEESE
Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good,

You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting,

You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile, the world goes on,

Meanwhile, the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes,

Over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers,

Meanwhile, the wild geese, high in the clean blue air are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

The world offers itself to your imagination.

Calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting,

Over and over announcing your place in the family of things.

Cry Of The Wild Goose – Frankie Laine