The fun in art lies, for me, in being experimental. Here are a few of the areas I’ve played around with. Different genres, materials and techniques. Art is a way to never grow up. (Click on any photo to enlarge all.)
For, the Daily Post Photo Challenge: Experimental
Jester
These tipped-up lips of wide renown
of the world’s most famous clown
are but pigment and not the man.
We know him not, for no one can.
No one assumes the painful task
of seeing what’s behind the mask.
The cloth that wipes it off each night
brings his true nature into sight,
for painted smiles are thrown away
as truth of night displaces day.
Underneath his painted mask,
he hides the truth we dare not ask.
One more day of tricks and laughter
cannot make up for what comes after.
His face, stripped down to flesh and bone,
reveals that he is all alone.
A painted face, a made-up smile
cannot mend a lover’s guile.
For the dVerse pub prompt.
The temperature dropped 25 degrees as we drove from Missouri to Iowa today so I need something bright and cheery and warm. This triple beauty, just a bit autumnized, was found in the botanical gardens in Huntsville, Alabama, nine days ago. It probably wouldn’t have survived by now in Iowa weather. Brrrrr.
Getting ready to leave for Minnesota in an hour, so I’ll rely on a poem written two years ago that meets the demands of the prompt word today, which was “honk.”
Sweet Clover
Before our dad told us its real name,
we used to call it wild mustard.
What did we know about sweet clover except for its color
and that summer smell, cloying in its sugared perfume.
It filled the air and smothered the plains—
bright yellow and green where before
brown stubble had peeked through blown snow.
On these dry lands, what flowers there were
tended to be cash crops or cattle feed.
Sweet clover or alfalfa.
The twitching noses of baby rabbits brought home by my dad
as we proffered it to them by the handful.
Fragile chains we draped around our necks and wrists.
Bouquets for our mom
that wilted as fast as we could pick them.
Summers were sweet clover and sweet corn
and first sweethearts parked on country roads,
windows rolled down to the night air,
then quickly closed to the miller moths.
Heady kisses,
whispered confessions, declarations,
unkept promises.
What we found most in these first selfish loves
was ourselves.
The relief of being chosen
and assurance that all our parts worked.
Our lips accepting those pressures unacceptable
just the year before.
Regions we’d never had much congress with before
calling out for company.
That hard flutter
like a large moth determined to get out.
Finding to our surprise,
like the lyrics of a sixties song,
that our hearts could break, too.
Hot summer nights,
“U”ing Main,
cars full of boys honking
at cars full of girls.
Cokes at Mack’s cafe.
And over the whole town
that heavy ache of sweet clover.
Half promise, half memory.
A giant invisible hand
that covered summer.
The prompt word today was honk.
This advice to young men by Norm deserves to go viral. Please spread the word, but remember to give credit to him!!
For my newer followers my Advice for Young Men series usually pokes fun at the differences between men and women. You can read some previous installments here and here.
I’m overdue for a good rant though, so today’s post isn’t very funny. Then again, neither is the subject: sexual harassment and inappropriate sexual behavior by men.
Warning: If foul language offends you then I suggest you skip this post.
For everyone else, settle in for this listicle – 8 Tips for Not Behaving Like a Sexual Predator – sarcastically written specifically for guys who still don’t get it.
1. Learn how to hold your liquor.
Alcohol is often referred to as a great social lubricant. Yes it’s good for getting conversations flowing, but as someone who in his younger days once woke up with his winter boots and a parka on in a someone’s bathtub, I can confirm…
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jdbphoto
Little Duck is checking it out and he can’t believe it any more than I can. Out of eight socks taken out of the dryer, six of them are mismatched—which means each of them matches none of the others! You may think some look like they match, but none of them remotely do. If they are the same length, one is heavy and the other see-through. I cannot figure it out as I have even purchased two new pairs of black socks since I left Mexico. Mismatched socks are a Bummer!!! May have to go buy myself some M&M‘s to console myself. Mmmm good.
(This photo from the internet was released to the public domain.)
P.S. This photo was not staged. I’d taken this photo tonight before I saw the challenge. I was trying to figure out how to use it and asked forgottenman, “Can you figure out some word with two m’s in it that describes mismatched socks?” He said, “Ummm–mismatched?” “Brilliant!” I said. “How did you come up with that so fast?” “You really didn’t notice that mismatched had two m’s in it?” he countered. “Yes, that’s why I called you brilliant.” “Dear,” he said, “you said it to me! ‘Mismatched socks’?” Duh. We leave tomorrow for Minnesota. In the rush of packing, not to mention frustration over non-matching socks, my mind seems to have become addlepated. I’ll be my usual perfect self tomorrow.
What a great idea: (Use the link below the photo.)
These bracelets, which I have on today, brought to mind this poem from two years ago that deals with (or at the very least, makes use of) today’s prompt word of “dubious.” I lived and traveled for many years abroad..a number of those years spent in Africa or traveling through Indonesia and this poem always reminds me of the thousands of artisans I met during those years, not knowing that later I would become an artisan myself.
The Stories Held by Things
Niata and Solchi sit in the shade of a baobob,
coils of bright plastic between them,
bright green, pink, white, black, green.
Blue. Yellow.
They do not touch the yellow.
They are afraid of it, perhaps,
or dubious. Yellow is the color of the water
that carried their sister away
as she called out to them,
helpless on the bank––
the color
of the skin of their brother
who was surrendered to the water
to be carried away as well.
Yellow is not in their
creative vocabulary
as they wind, wind the plastic cord
into bracelets, forming designs
of checkerboards and crosses,
stripes like the stripes in candy canes
given in December by the missionaries.
Now a band of blue, then back to white lines
on black backgrounds.
They fantasize about
who would wear these bracelets.
A penny each, they are given for their efforts.
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One of the highlights of my week and always one of the highlights of my trips to Missouri was a visit to Evelyn’s wonderful antiques store. She was redecorating and painting, so the stock was about half of what it usually was, but I still found some finds, including a delicious apple from her bowl put there for the taking. I would have bought this spinning wheel if I’d had a way to get it to Mexico. The little dog greets every visitor for a friendly rub before jumping back up to his perch. I love this place.
(Please click on any photo to enlarge them all.)
Okay, now on to Cee’s questions for the week:
Do you ever sit on a park bench for more than ten minutes? Rarely.
When you lose electricity in a storm, do you light the candles, turn on the flashlight or use your cell phone for light? I live in Mexico, where the electricity goes off frequently and sometimes for hours and even days. I have a handy supply of candles all over the house as well as kerosene lanterns and propane cylinder lamps that always seem to lack either fuel or mantles. In the past year I’ve purchased a few little battery-powered crookneck lamps that come in handy as well. I have a half dozen flashlights that are never in the right place at the right time so I hardly ever use them.
Would you rather be given $10,000 for your own use or $100,000 to give anonymously to strangers? At this point, I can think of some excellent uses for the $100,000–especially for education expenses for children in the village. I would have no problem finding proper recipients for it so I’d definitely make that choice.
What inspired you or what did you appreciate this past week? I loved not necessarily having to do anything (except blogging, of course) for the past week. For the last two days, however, most of our time had been taken up trying to figure out the intricacies of two computers with a lot of problems. Really frustrating. Thanks to three hours spent online via Team Viewer and Skype with a tech expert in Vancouver, we finally got some of the problems solved. An additional two hours spent trying to get social security problems solved via phone and internet led to no solutions at all. All in all, a frustrating day but luckily I feel most of the computer problems are solved. Thanks, Chad! (If anyone needs the name of an excellent and personable tech expert for Macs, I’d be glad to share his number.)
