of course cuba isn't entirely green - oh no - it is rich with colour.
i actually prefer the random appearance of colour in all parts and aspects of my life -
there's a tremendous metaphor in that.
seeing flowers was like stumbling across a long-forgotten treasure!
i came back again and again
to marvel at their simple complexities.
i held the petals and delicately brushed them between my fingers, holding them like the most fragile and rice paper. i pushed them against my face. it's so luxurious to feel their velvety softness.
i made sure to get very very close to them to soak in the detail and especially the vibrant energy
that emanates from these very tiny and very unlikely gifts.
19 comments:
What a tactile, sensory experience you had with the flowers, total appreciation. I love bougainvillea, especially because we really don't see them here in Michigan, except occasionally in someone's patio pot. To see them growing like that in their lushness must have been glorious. I felt that way about birds of paradise (though not so easy to brush my face with them) and poinsettia when we lived in Pasadena.
hi ruth - so much gets shut down or cloistered during the canadian winter that the sudden expansiveness attached to wearing less, being able to catch scents of cooking food, flowers, ocean winds, feeling the softness of humid air and being available to it all is overwhelming and allows for the pure magic that it all is to gain a foothold in your attention. again. steven
Hi steven, your post reminds me of a passage written by D.H. Lawrence about the sensuality of flowers that I read in high school. I can remember how impressed I was with his ability to take it all in. It was an early opening for me, to realize that there was so much more in the plant world than I had previously been aware.
In kindergarten these days we are looking at salt and sugar crystals in a microscope and describing what we see. They see jewels and exquisite beauty that they had not imagined was there. Up close, (and every other which way) the world is full of wonders
Steven, these pictures are really beautiful, a beauty you can almost feel and smell just by seeing. Imagine how good the color that nature has and can interfere in our lives.
good day for you.
oa.s
I love how you pushed them against your face to get a proper feel.
love the bougainvillea. mine has frozen to the ground two years in a row now. it had just bloomed again when it froze this winter. still hasn't come out yet.
I am so glad you escaped winter for awhile, that you put your feet on that colorful landscape.
There's a whole lot going on in your new banner. It's mesmerizing!
hey dan - i'd really like to read that lawrence passage. he wrote poems and included references to flowers in many of his stories. crystals, in a little while i will be sharing a post on an event yesterday involving ice crystals. i want to hold it off until i share my cuba posts though. steven
hello oa.s! thankyou for your kind words. flowers astonish me. i'm always brough to ask the question "how do they know to do all that?". have a lovely day. steven
tess - it's full in your face beauty. when my children were babies i flew them through trees and plants. i bet you did that also. they would scream and laugh and i guess some of that has rubbed on me as i get older. steven
ellen - how amazing to have such a luscious tropical plant in your own garden!! tough about the vagaries of the seasonal changes. steven
reya - that lovely header photo is from some woods not very far from here. i see every season and every bridge between the seasons in that picture. i'm so glad you like it. steven
How gorgeous, Steven. Your final photo looks just like Matisse!
I have to admit that I (we) nibbled on cherry blossoms while immersed in their magic...it's irresistable!
A true traveller, a man who truly appreciates the wonders of an alien (to him) environment. You have come back with wonderful photos.
I have never seen or heard of these plants before. Bougainvillea? They are awesome. Some of the clusters of white/pink stamens look like little faces popping out of the rosy petals and lovely green leaves. If I held them close to my face, I know i would break out in a rash. They are so beautiful, though Stephen. I know ten people who went to Cuba this winter and I have only seen beach and hotel pictures. Thank you for sharing these flowers.
jo i say become one with the flower! thanks for your kind comment. steven
friko - i wish i could travel more and wider and perhaps one day that wish will become true. steven
linda - i couldn't stop looking around me. there's more to come so come back again. steven
The touch and feel of petals speaks spring. Oh, how I want to visit Cuba!
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