Monday, September 30, 2013

on the front line


portraits of the teacher as a gradually and inexorably maturing man. 


of course there are those who would question my definition of the term "maturing"!!!

Sunday, September 29, 2013

this colour filled whole


a day of pure blue sky 

on my way home from time at the "y" with my one and only, i looked across the otonabee river and really felt the autumn through the colours emerging on the east bank . . . (far away, and when zoomed in closer) - gifts! i say gifts!


 and then in the door of my home, a quick over the shoulder glance at the stairway and the stained glass and english ivy somehow carried the colourful whole of this day into a sort of closure as the sun fell low below the horizon that much earlier than yesterday 




Saturday, September 28, 2013

sometimes summer home

i'm missing my sometimes summer home this evening . . . barely three feet tall and just wide enough and long enough to contain my body, my gear, a bottle of wine and snacks . . .



it held the warmth, kept out the insects, was my home . . .

Friday, September 27, 2013

a sweet early autumn day . . .

a beginning day with an invitation to join my friends michael and andrea for coffee, fruit and fresh out of the oven apple scones! small joys that this approaching maturity - surely but gingerly - man welcomes.


the view from my seat.


a little closer to the river...


looking west . . . 


the skies later the same day under myself and my class walking to raise money for cancer research . . .

Thursday, September 26, 2013

quietude





i have need to busy my heart with quietude.

rupert brooke

Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

cloudplay




Monday, September 23, 2013

everywhere i look . . .


the earth is crying-sweet,
and scattering-bright the air,
eddying, dizzying, closing round ...


earth's still a-tremble there,
and winds are scented yet,
and memory-soft the air ...




words excerpted from "beauty and beauty" by rupert brooke

Sunday, September 22, 2013

a rainy day

these are from yesterday -  a rainy day in late summer . . . .



Saturday, September 21, 2013

Park(ing) day . . .

on september 20th a special event takes place all over the place and maybe even around the world!

Park(ing) Day . . . .

i am happy to say that i had a wonderful surprise on sherbrooke street as i was biking home and stopped in at the Electric City Bread Company for some of their astonishingly good breads and pastries, and saw that the good people at the  Avant-Garden Shop (more-or-less right next door) had joined in the annual Park(ing) Day event by transforming a metered parking spot into this lovely little oasis! hurray again for my cool little town!





Friday, September 20, 2013

fragments



driven by the forces of love,
the fragments of the world seek each other
so that the world may come to being.

pierre teilhard de chardin

Thursday, September 19, 2013

autumn's hands



autumns hands are the softest of all the seasons as she cloaks her world in fog and the sun settles less and less on this part of the planet . . . .

Wednesday, September 18, 2013

there is no here and there



the morning fog erased the line between water and air .........

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

i know this . . .


i know this
in the way i have loved and love,
that there is this matter of surface beauty
that points quite deliberately
towards something
that cannot be reduced
to "something"
and actually escapes objectification.

it is
a state without condition
that resolves
under its own weight 
into something much more -
a something that has its own life 
and exists without condition

that through some miracle
 rises into the condition
of being and becoming a part of this state of existence







“the weight of the world is love. 
under the burden of solitude, 
under the burden of dissatisfaction 
the weight,the weight we carry is love. ” 

allen ginsberg

Monday, September 16, 2013

much



there is
in this entirely vivid time
some small consolation
in the fact 
that it is
that much easier
and that much more certain
to understand and appreciate
when what is real
is so much more apparent

Sunday, September 15, 2013

the impending storm


as if they could sense the storm, the ducks all swam in silence against the current, working closer to shore where, in the lee of a long ago fallen and half submerged tree, they gathered and 
began to discuss the impending events.

Saturday, September 14, 2013

cloud break


to the summit of heaven the clouds
are rolling aloft like steam;



there's a break in their infinite shrouds,
and below it a gleam.



words excerpted from cloud-break by archibald lampman

Friday, September 13, 2013

petals



a victory! to leave your loneliness
panting behind you on some street corner
while you float free into a cloud of sudden azaleas,
pink petals that have never felt loneliness,
no matter how slowly they fell.

excerpted from "the rider" by naomi shihab nye

Thursday, September 12, 2013

the september webs



 the spider, dropping down from twig,
 unfolds a plan of her devising,
 a thin premeditated rig
 to use in rising.

 and all that journey down through space,
 in cool descent and loyal hearted,
 she spins a ladder to the place
 from where she started.

 thus i, gone forth as spiders do
 in spider's web a truth discerning,
 attach one silken thread to you
 for my returning.

e. b. white

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

the lovely cat

so very beautiful a cat!



"how we behave toward cats here below determines our status in heaven."

robert a. heinlein

Tuesday, September 10, 2013

portals

a visit to the distillery district in toronto for lunch . . . i love the bricks . . .

and especially


the cool portals


Monday, September 9, 2013

early september sunset



a heaven so clear, an earth so calm,
so sweet, so soft, so hushed an air;
and, deepening still the dream-like charm ...

emily jane bronte


i rode my bike down to cobourg right after school. there was a good headwind all the way, so i stopped in millbrook at the pastry peddler for some crazy good quiche and a huge pastry. i got back on the road down to cobourg, and rode up and over the oak ridges moraine finally ariving in cobourg just in time to wish my buddy rick baker good luck with his photography and prose exhibition down in rochester. that's right - i yelled across lake ontario and i bet rick heard!

the photograph is taken down at monk's cove in cobourg at that moment . . . .


Sunday, September 8, 2013

sun light



we live so close

so closely

we become colour
we become music


Saturday, September 7, 2013

light and shadow



both light and shadow
are the dance of love.

rumi

Friday, September 6, 2013

city lights across the bay . . .



one time more, my love, the net of light extinguishes
work, wheels, flames, boredoms and farewells,

the moon alone in the midst of its clear page
the room acquires the slowness of gold,

until we are only the one dark space
one drop in the flow of a vast slow river.

-

excerpted and reassembled phrases from
"one time more, my love, the net of light extinguishes"

pablo neruda

Thursday, September 5, 2013

late summer evening in the rain


riding down the main street of peterborough in an evening of rain . . .