Monday Morning Musings:

Blink, and Look Again

“There’s a certain slant of light,
On winter afternoons,
That oppresses, like the weight
Of cathedral tunes. . .”
—Emily Dickinson,

“Tell all the truth but tell it slant —”
—Emily Dickinson

I have more to say about images,
the ones within the ones in frames,
the shadows and reflections,
the dreamworlds
and the in-between

what you see and don’t,
the half-glimpsed, and
the quickly vanished.

Consider the photos
of galaxies beyond, the ghost light we see,
a miracle, amazing, full of color, brighter
than what we’ve ever seen before—

and yet,
it’s a blink from the past,
there’s no way to capture the present,
and hold it tight,

^{Eagles and Crows at the River}

each second flies,
but why do some move so swiftly
on eagle wings,
while others linger,
as bees on flowers–
some burst bright-blossomed,
others fade like the moon
smiling into sunrise clouds,
but most tick past, tiny ants
in the dirt of time.

Quickly, how our babies grow.
Suddenly, how summer skin turns cold.
The green world is dying,
the world is burning and frying,
the grass is crunchy,
the ponds and streams are dry.
We close our windows, turn on the a/c,
say goodbye,
then eat our salads, as so many die.

Life wasn’t simpler before,
we simply didn’t want to know
all the worlds are connected,
the future holds the past.

Who is the woman in the mirror?
What happened to the dark-haired girl?
See my long-legged shadow? A super-hero
in another realm
who bends the light, to see the slant,
in that,
a prism of colors, truth abloom—
perhaps, more than one timeline in this room.

My readers know I love time, shadows, reflections, and all the in-between things. I’m still thinking about the exhibit we saw Pictures in Pictures,

as well as recent movies mentioned in previous posts (Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes and Everything Everywhere All at Once) and then Emily Dickinson popped into my head (as she does) 😏. And the recent Webb Telescope Photos. Now we’re watching Shining Girls (Apple TV), starring Elisabeth Moss, which combines searching for a serial killer who attacked her and time travel—shifting realities. We’re about half-way through the series. Here’s the trailer. I hadn’t watched it before. You probably know already if you’d like this type of show.

It’s been too hot to go anywhere. We may get storms tonight. I’m hoping we get steady rain, not a sudden burst. We had a lot of rain in the spring and early summer, but now everything is very dry from the extreme heat.

There’s been a lot of bird action at the river recently. I’ve seen the young eagle a few times, and once watched crows chasing it.

We’ve been eating this tomato salad a lot for dinner. I never was that fond of tomatoes, but these fresh Jersey farm stand tomatoes with salt, good olive oil, fresh basil, and some fresh mozzarella, along with bread to mop up the juice, are the perfect hot weather dinner.