More Image Inspired... this by my friend Lander

Girl on a Boat

By Lander VerHoef 

I came with my camera to tell the tale of the war, or so I thought. I stood on the dock as the boat pulled alongside. A young Vietnamese girl, perhaps eight or ten stood just across the rail from me, and I was caught by her eyes. They were old, older than a child's, older than mine, older than imagining. Those eyes had seen...

    

But whatever they had seen, I saw only myself reflected in them, a young white man in fancy shoes, a shirt soaked with sweat, and an expensive camera. And in those eyes was a question, and an accusation: "Why are you here?" I discovered that I had no answer, so I raised my camera and hid. But every day since I took that photo, I look at it and the young girl's old eyes ask me "why are you here? Why are you here? Why are you here?"

Yom Hashoah

Silent Illumination

Plunged in darkness, boxed

Barricaded, with no where to look

Gazes’ unseeing, freshly bruised

Open mouths still clotting

Taking refuge in shadow

Mothers, their angles grown sharp

Pierce skin stretched too thin

Seeping apprehension

Colorless light swings across  

Glassy eyed sisters who hold off the

Gripping cold, fear fueling

Their umbrage

Silhouetted, supple, wary

Daughters, whose eyes are open

Wide, uncomprehending

Certain they misunderstand

Early morning light filtered

Through a sky bathed in smoke

Mothers, sisters, and daughters

Collected, sampled, and sorted

Glistening shorn scalps, stripped

Likewise stained by fear, their sameness

Revealed, is of no consequence

No one looks

The glare of exposed bulbs  

Collective exhaustion of feet

Faltering, resisting, what eyes

Will not see 

Color smears the horizon

Emerging into that last bit of light

Flushed with hope, still unaware

Others who seethe, curl, and drift away

My email address was down. I think must have change a filter by accident when updating my domain name. If I missed an email from you I am sorry, that said, jennifer@workingink.com is up an receiving e-mail once again.

Look forwarding to hearing from you.

Image Prompts

 After reading some very visually rich and compelling essays by my friend Lander I found myself thinking about the power of visual prompts vs. written ones. Our conversation had begun with a brief discussion of film as a story-telling medium. A picture may be worth a 1000 words, but what the picture has to say needs to be scrutinized, because it is no less malleable than language in its ability to misguide us. Truth aside, the power of language and film combined to convey depth of experience seems nearly limitless to my mind and for awhile I will be experimenting with both mediums. Please share your thoughts on employing these mediums. I'd love to hear from you.

Image Prompt 1 -    Chinatown

I did not expect

to love a face

So like my own.

Still, here we are,

Lanterns, round and pale,

Flex against their supports,

Like Chinese Apples

Dropping before a frost.

 

Our feet follow

Worn cobblestones

Announce our urgency

We climb your stairs

Young trees

Bending, pounding

The field with

Ripe exotic fruit.

jee 2012