Category Archives: Art

Pencil Noir #7

December 2, 2015 By in Art, Pencil Noir, Poetry Tags: , , , , , 46 Comments

” There is no route out of the maze. The maze shifts as you move through it, because it is alive.” ….Philip K. Dick

 

hello….hello….hello….

I’ve returned from traveling on the dark side of the mountain. I was never really (completely) lost. It did require entering the mountain to find my way out though, as the mountains began to float away.

While underground I made steps through the dark tunnels trusting a lighted candle. Finally I came upon an immense cavern and there I found a working head lamp, a pencil and a passage to the open air.

The moon’s light cast long shadows as I swam towards shore. Floating on my back, I sent it kisses. Digging in the sand at the shoreline I looked for wave washed shells to tell me their secrets. Before continuing on my way along a phosphorescent passage of singing shells.

Now I am here retrieving my poethead. And finding rhythm in the alchemy of the virtual heart.

 

Pencil drawing by j.h. white

Microbial fantasia #4

October 23, 2014 By in Art, Microbial fantasia, Poetry Tags: , , , , , , , , 41 Comments

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floating circles_2~

This finely tuned edge enchanted by chaos,

the equilibrium of its awareness

becoming ever more fluid

ever more graceful

ever more free

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“Don’t play what’s there, play what’s not there.”
― Miles Davis, Kind of Blue

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 Well…this post ends the Microbial Fantasia series. I’m sure these community oriented creatures will show up again in some form. They seem to pop up at unexpected times. It’s impossible for me to ignore their wit and enthusiasm.

Speaking now for the more demanding and less accommodating among their numbers, I recently acquired a cold from my toddler grand son. Teeming with a virus, I was still determined to venture into new territory, reading a few of my poems for the first time at a relatively serious, eclectic open mike poetry series in town.  I’d been attending for a while, but only participating in the audience, gathering my own momentum, building up steam to eventually read myself.

With a head full of fog and drift, there wasn’t much room for nerves, so I just signed up at # 11….my lucky number… and awaited my turn. It was an especially intimate night… smaller in numbers and with some of my favorite poets reading. Everyone had settled in to really listen.

When it came my turn, while I was reading, I felt…well… like I was here.  All the comments and dialogue, all of our camaraderie surrounded me.  I found my voice … up there, on stage, under the spotlights, working with a microphone….all for the first time. In my life.

I was completely surprised how enjoyable the experience was. So how could I not be grateful to these rowdy microbial guests,  my visiting virus, for getting me out there.

Never underestimate possibilities in chaos, I remind myself. Hah!

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painting/paper collage:  j h white

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Microbial fantasia #3

October 16, 2014 By in Art, Microbial fantasia, Poetry Tags: , , , , , , , 33 Comments

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Trio 2~

Tepid fleshed, soft and juicy.

we move through

the microbial stew

with

winged thoughts,

hearts that prism lightning

and

opposable dancing thumbs

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“A scientist in his laboratory is not a mere technician: he is also a child confronting natural phenomena that impress him as though they were fairy tales.”  – Marie Curie
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“Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different speeds. A sense of humor is just common sense dancing.” – William James
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painting /collage and poem:  j h white

 

 

Microbial fantasia #2

October 8, 2014 By in Art, Microbial fantasia, Poetry Tags: , , , , , , , 11 Comments

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fantasia #2_2

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Grazing

our lips meet

in wild fields

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 Before sailing

into

 a jungle

of beastly

delight

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“Passions that quicken your senses, fulfill; quench the thirst of lonesome years! Yet the sun has shadows, learn to control your will; to enjoy life long happiness, not tears! Wait! Rise to the stars above & thrill! Arouse the very flames of life! Sweetheart, kiss me: Hold still, hold still!”….. Excerpt from Dr Bronner’s original rant.

Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soap … http://www.subgenius.com/updates/5-99news/X0007_BRONNER.txt.html

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“The human microbiome (or human microbiota) is the aggregate of microorganisms, a microbiome that resides on the surface and in deep layers of skin, in the saliva and oral mucosa, in the conjunctiva, and in the gastrointestinal tracts. They include bacteria, fungi, and archaea. One study indicated they outnumber human cells 10 to 1.”

Human microbiome …. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_microbiome

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Drawing and poem … j h white

 

Microbial Fantasia #1

September 26, 2014 By in Art, Microbial fantasia, Poetry Tags: , , , , , , , 25 Comments

Scan_2~

How many times will I shed raw and return?

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Or is it a stronger current

amorphously assembling and deconstructing

as I unwittingly rally

behind the porosity of thought

the seduction of words

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I am a small planet

a symbiotic microbial world

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My peripheral orbit

 flings so far in its trajectory

that now

the axis is nearly invisible.

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I can only feel it…

Imagining

this bright nucleus of love

teeming with life…

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Tantra involves a very powerful substance, which is buddha-nature, or our enlightened nature, eating us from the inside out rather than being reached by stripping away layers from the outside.

 Crazy Wisdom by Chögyam Trungpa

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“If something burns your soul with purpose and desire, it’s your duty to be reduced to ashes by it. Any other form of existence will be yet another dull book in the library of life.”
― Charles Bukowski

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Poem and sketch by j.h.white. …..I am aware that microbes are single cell organisms.  In representing my relationship with them in this series though,  I prefer immersion without thought, surrendering to the imaginative, perceptual and sensate possibilities.   Symbiotic microcosmic navigation amongst my tribes….xxoo

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Pencil noir #5

September 3, 2014 By in Art, Pencil Noir, Poetry Tags: , , , , , , 25 Comments

ebola workers~

I want to understand my part is in this tragedy. I see these images every day…..the white suits, the latrine green or bubblegum pink plastic gloves.

I stare at the photo from NBC World News.  I’d googled face masks worn in epidemics after listening to an NPR broadcast about the Liberian aide workers who have taken the job of bringing in the dead. How does one comprehend such a thing?

I decided to draw one of the photos…to find the spaces between the forms…to make this intimate in some way. It becomes a meditation as I concentrate on the crisp plastic suits, the individual postures of the men, the dark slits behind the masks. I breath in, paying attention to the act of drawing what I see.

I breath out. I begin to feel I am breathing for the aide workers who are praying that they remain protected within those suits.

I breath in. I breath out. I feel as if I am breathing now for the ones in the bags. The ones who are no longer breathing. I breath to ease their passage in death. I breath for the loved ones, the children left behind. I keep breathing and concentrating.

I begin mixing the colors for the gloves. Zinc white, phthalo turquoise, a little Jenkins green. I’m almost finished. While applying the paint to the gloves, however,  I am overcome. I watch as all my own sorrows rise to the surface. I realize now that sorrow is simply sorrow.  I am unable to separate one sorrow from another.

But through this experience I have learned one personal way to be with what is happening in the world I live in and am a part of. Each moment as I breath in, as I breath out, life presents itself.  This becomes my prayer….my quiet revolution.

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Here is the link to the NPR (National Public Radio) episode. It’s one of the more human articles and well worth a look.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/goatsandsoda/2014/08/28/343479917/they-are-the-body-collectors-a-perilous-job-in-the-time-of-ebola

 

Pencil noir #4

August 26, 2014 By in Art, Pencil Noir, Poetry Tags: , , , , 34 Comments

trio 1

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She’s asking me if I’d do something a little weird for her….saying she needs someone to pose for her…some project she’s working on. All I have to do is look up. “You’re kidding, right?”

But I follow her up the back steps from the kitchen into the side alley. It’s a slice of sky. Blue. No clouds. Some festival music, piped in, drifting over from the Square.

She’s saying, ” OK Joey… relax. You’re really helping me out … just move around, slow like … and then look up.” I look at her instead. She’s animated, laughing, messing with her camera but I can tell she’s concentrating on getting her shots.

It isn’t easy…her looking at me this way. My shoulders tense and I notice my hands are balling into loose fists.

Between shots I look over and catch a glimpse of my car in the parking lot next to the alley. Mat black, it’s stripped down. Everything is in the engine.

I see some kids walking into the parking lot. The music from the Square is getting louder … not piped in anymore … charging the air.  One of the kid stops, leaning on my car to light a cigarette.  It ticks me off but then I can see it. I mean… look what else is in the lot. It makes him feel cool.

“OK … just one more. This is great.” She turns her head to see what has caught my attention. I look back at her and give her a nod.  Her back is to the kids now as she angles to get her shot. I lift my chest, suck in, and look up one more time.

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Pencil drawing ….j.h. white