1-Ashes

I wasn’t as excited about going to India as I might have been.

Our son, our middle child, passed away the previous month.  We’d been taking care of details and putting our home back into some sense of order.  Dan had lived with us the last several years and became a central focus of our daily lives because of his health issues.

Phil and I came on this trip to get beyond our grief.  In a way, it honored Dan.  He  had studied photography in college and had helped us both improve our efforts.  My dream had been that he and Phil could go on photo-shoots together when I was physically unable to because of my RA.  Now, I guess, it’s up to me.

In India my senses will turn outward.  I can’t seem to write about Dan right now.  I need to turn inward to do that.

“Photography and writing deepen and widen and expand our sense of life: they feed the soul,” according to the novelist Anne Lamott.  I’m counting on these kinds of soul food to revive me from my lassitude.

Jungle Cat Stalking Prey
by Phil Haffley

USA

From Ghost Trees to young Cypress (sans knobby knees) to Alligator Junipers—from India to Baton Rouge to Madera Canyon—our travels have been extensive so far this year.  Yet they seem to be coming to an end for 2016.

We are home again after two short photo-shoots separated by only five days.  That was time enough to wash clothes, download photos, and repack camera gear.  In Arizona I was going to need my heavy SLR Canon camera and gear because we would be working from tripods.

On the boats in the bayous of Louisiana and the jeeps in India however, I needed to handhold cameras which meant lighter gear.  Yes, I’m jealous of all the new professional cameras and lenses I’m no longer able to handle.  Their pictures are superb at 20-plus mega-pixels which I interpret to mean lots of cropping room.

What I’ve learned is that India may be unique, but our own country can be just as magical with Spanish Moss flowing from cypress limbs and Sycamores of the desert southwest seeming to be the American version of India’s Giant Ghost Trees.

Phil and I have many photos to process—thousands of them.  It’s going to take time to get them ready for this blog and for me to write a story or two about our encounters in nature.  We never did get photos of nesting trogons, but they are there as close as the Madera Canyon of Arizona.

Namaste

A f;lirting peacock from Bandhavgarh National Park, India
Photo by Phil Haffley

haiku

evening, black lava,

perched atop, yellow warbler—

a nugget of gold

Chirp

     Chirping, she expects me
     to follow her up a tree
     or under a raspberry bush.

     When she tires,
     I pick her up,
     kiss her forehead.

     A bottle of goat’s milk
     warms on the stove.
     Her chirps grow louder as she
     kicks free of the towel
     I’m using to protect
     my clothes as I hold her.
     I coo, ‘Soon.  Soon now,’
     as if she could
     understand.

     Rewrapped
     cradled in my arm,
     she sucks the nipple
     once,
     twice,
     thrice,
     then pushes the bottle away
     with five-fingered paws.
     She yawns,
     gulps,
     tries again.

     Her belly swollen,
     I set the bottle aside.
     Under the tap, I wash
     tiny hands and sticky snout.
     She nestles in my arm
     and purrs
     while I dream of the bridge
     I will build
     so a small raccoon may cross
     from my world
     back into hers.

Photo Shoot

               I step into a cooling
               pool of possibilities,
               sink into a reflective background,
               splash to shower my images
               with creativity,
               preen to remove unwanted ticks,
               and pretend my prints are pearls.

One of Them

Cinnamon-sugar sand—
light on the cinnamon—
corrugated sand
sculpted by waves
spills into my shoes.
I wade toward the surf-wetted interface
where strolling will be easier.

My visit will be brief hosted by the
heartbeat of surf
spicy scent of seawater
feathers of a breeze.

I reach down for a scallop shell.
I feel the smoothness of its pearl
and the roughness of  its surface—
gentleness inside
toughness outside
like most of us.

I stop to watch
black-bellied plovers
glean the surf
Bonaparte’s gulls
                sunbathe on a sand spit
brown pelicans
                dive-bomb for dinner
Forester’s terns
                frolic on air
and I am at one with them
until the tour bus leaves.

Hermit Crab
by Jan Haffley

Godzilla Rises

Godzilla rises from the sea

To put a scare in you and me

Until we look at pixels and see

An enchanting ghost of what could be.

Marine Iguana
by Jan Haffley