Drawing Constellations

Drawing constellations in skies of dream,
landscaped as colors growing wild, extreme,
pulsing surrounding vibrations unseen,
in star-gathered moonlight, whispering beam
unconscious, unlimited, in between

Continuing my recent star theme…I actually did this awhile ago, but I’ve been tweaking the poem on and off.  This is for Jane Dougherty’s last poetry challenge posted back in the end of September.  The poetic form was her own invention:  a single stanza of five lines of ten syllables each, and the five end of line words all rhyme.   Here’s the artwork she provided:

I miss Jane’s prompts.

Hope/#PoetsForPeace

“Where flowers bloom, so does hope.”
–Lady Bird Johnson

“If you could
have three wishes, what?”
Number one–
always “peace.”
I’ve been repeating that word
since I was a child.

What is peace?
Easy to say what
it is not–
not guns, not
bombs, not hate or violence.
Not this destruction.

There are seeds
but they need sunlight–
fertile soil
to nourish
growth, to send roots; open space
to reach for the sky.

This is not
complicated.  This
happens if
we let it–
the Earth can teach us if we
can’t find our way home.

Despite the way we mistreat it, the Earth still shares with us its bounty.  As it does each summer, the Rose of Sharon tree is blooming, surrounded by concrete and the sorrows of our world.

Writer’s Quote Wednesday Writing Challenge Theme-“Hope” #WQWWC

Join in with your poem here.

(More) Miriam Schapiro

Doesn’t Schapiro’s “Beauty of Summer”, above, look like one of Nina’s rose pictures?  Unfortunately, Nina wasn’t able to get into the city to see the show at the National Academy Museum that closed in May, but I took some photos to share when I visited.

A few years ago, Nina and I went to a show of her works at the Flomenhaft Gallery in Chelsea.  Reproductions can’t duplicate the intricacy of her painted collages.

This show was much more extensive and included work from beginning to end.

One delight and inspiration after another!

I was excited to see a few of her window works, including the one that directly inspired a monthly grid to illustrate and e.e. cummings poem last year.

The shrines really appeal to me too.

It’s difficult to take in all the detail in Schapiro’s “My History” from a photo.  This work in particular gives me a lot of ideas for both writing and art.

I have referenced this wonderful artist, who died just about a year ago, often.  You can see other posts about Miriam Schapiro here here and here.

Flowers for Tuesday

Despite my best efforts the only art related thing I did over the weekend was clean up my art room. I did this drawing the other day at work, hence the yellow daffodils done with a highlighter. I intend to start painting in oils (or maybe acrylics, seeing what Laura achieved with that medium). Meanwhile I have to get back into a work mode after a hedonistic weekend of wine drinking. 

Flowers

I first drew an impressionistic representation, and then I abstracted it.  Neocolor dipped in water.  Which version do you like?

May 2016: Opening Her Arms

“The peony was as big as this,”
says the little girl
opening her arms.
–Issa

Issa, one of the four classic haiku masters of Japan, wrote over 20,000 haiku, often illustrated with his own drawings.  His work is known for its simplicity and directness.

After posting art and poetry every day in April, I will be here irregularly for awhile.  Lots going on this month.  I may not see your posts everyday, either, but I will catch up as time allows.

A note on the grid:  I found some flower graphs I had done for sweaters and thought: “I could make a collage out of this.”  I was not really thinking about how many of those tiny squares there actually were.  The squares were cut from magazine photos I had of flowers.

Blue Roses 6/quilt

I’m down to six roses remaining and I feel sad. I’ve enjoyed making these pieces with the roses cut out of an old skirt. This one is the simplest and it has a kind of Warhol look. 

The stitching is hard to see in the photo. It’s not real stitching; it is drawn in. Here’s a closeup: 

 
A beautiful Friday here in my neck of the woods. Enjoy the weekend, lovely WP friends. 

A Birthday Mandala with Fortunate Greeting

Pick a path/with heart
You have an active mind/and a keen imagination
Don’t worry/prosperity will knock on your door soon
Good luck follows you/stop and let it catch up

Coincidence?  Nina posted a mandala this morning too.  This is a Happy Birthday Mandala for Nina today.  It’s loosely based on one of the lovely cards she gave to me when we had lunch.

One of the NaPoWriMo prompts last week was to use fortune cookie fortunes to make a poem.  I found a bunch I had saved in a little popsicle stick jewelry box one of my daughters made me long ago, and picked out a few that would work in a cleave poem and as a birthday greeting.  OK, the last one is a fortune from a Bazooka Joe comic, but I decided it counted too.

Happy Birthday Nina!

Blue Roses 5/Circle Game

Fifth in the series and nearing the end; I think there will be two more and then no more roses. I don’t know if this is the best or the worst one but I had a lot of fun with it. 

I’m not sure if the detail will come out well. Here are a few close ups.  

    
 

National Orchid Day (Lunch with Nina)

Space opens
with hands of friends
orchids move
shimmering like
butterflies
aiming events
into synchronicity

When Nina and I had lunch last weekend, I took a photo of Nina’s hand too.  It happened to be behind the orchids on the table, which fits in perfectly into Doodlewash‘s celebratory month of days.  I haven’t attempted a still life in a very long time, so I painted one based on my photo.

The poem uses this week’s words from The Secret Keeper:
(5) Words: | SPACE | FRIEND | EVENT | MOVE | AIM |

and one of the NaPoWriMo prompts for a flower poem.

and is in a form introduced to me by The Elusive Trope, the Whitney.