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What's a picture's worth?
It may be worth a thousand words, but sometimes a picture - a still
frame in the mind - inspires more than a thousand. Consider this claim
from Elizabeth Goudge (The Joy of Snow): "A book begins with
a falling in love. You lose your heart to a place, a house, an avenue of
trees, or with a character who walks in and takes sudden and complete
possession of you. Imagination glows, and there is the seed of your
book."
I challenge you not only to look at these pictures, but to allow them
to take "possession of you" (or, if you rather, allow yourself to take
possession of them), and write what you see - and then some.
My mom took this photo in Pecos, New Mexico, not far from Guadalupe National Park in Texas. It could come from an Edgar Allan Poe poem . . . They say you learn best by teaching, so if Ellen keeps this up, she won't need a bib. This is our next child in a fancy 3-D view. Isn't she/he cute? Abandoned things attract me - stories surround them, ones better than what I would make up.
Taken by Marjory Collins in May 1942. Seen in Washington, D.C. I'm envisioning a one-act play (a comedy, of course) showing us the story of the guys who put these up. This is my dad's house in NH. These unexpected guests literally dropped by. My dad invited them in and treated them to breakfast. It sounds to me like a scene from The Odyssey; surely they had a tale to tell. What is it about the human expression that carries so much weight?
Taken by John Vachon around 1943. Food tastes better when you've worked for it. Would such an evening inspire a poem from Robert Frost? Maybe you could work in this building someday. You'll need to work hard in English class, though. Sometimes the chair feels just right. So the hog says to the buffalo . . . Such scenes have inspired literature before - consider Willa Cather's My Antonia. Imagine being the person who had to clean the rooms at this motel in Mitchell before the rules were made about pheasant cleaning . . . This is our second child at 12 weeks old. I wonder if it's possible to write a convincing descriptive poem about what it's like in there? Remember that snow day in May? It destroyed those stalwart trees in our neighborhood, reminding us how vulnerable we are in this world. I took this shot while hiking in New Hampshire. Sarah, a ninth grader, took this shot in Keystone and converted it to black and white on her computer. Jenny, an 11th grader, took this shot of a stone wall. My brother-in-law took this shot while on vacation in New Mexico. Brittany, an 11th grader, took this shot. This is my brother and his wife at their wedding in Massachusetts. My wife took a picture of lunch - looks like a page out of a cookbook.
My mom took this photo in Pecos, New Mexico, not far from Guadalupe National Park in Texas. It could come from an Edgar Allan Poe poem . . .
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This site was last updated
01/25/07
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