Month: June 2021

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art Photography Photoshop Uncategorized

An Amazing Development With Photoshop

Amazing development with PhotoshopCC. Adobe is introducing a number of so called neural filters which in this case colorizes black and white photographs. Amazing. I think some of the processing is done in the cloud,, however, you do have to download some additional software to add onto Photoshop. A Photoshop subscription has always been an expensive one, however, it may now be worth it to me. (After all these years!)

I continue to experiment but the second image was done with just one click and no adjustment of settings. I am using a free image from the Library of Congress as an example, I don’t want to get into a discussion of changing the historical record. As I see it, a digital library may want to offer colorized version just as addition. Many people dismiss important photos simply because they don’t like black and white. Well, do we have your attention now?

“Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Black-and-White Negatives”

“Grand Coulee Dam, Columbia Basin Reclamation Project. The east face of block 31 with a portion of the deep crevice shown in the foreground showing the high trestle, elev. 1028, high pour in center of picture at elev. 915; bottom of crevice at elev. 795; and deck of low trestle at elev. 950.”

#photography#photoshop#history#photoshopCC#creativecloud

A little more artistic photo from the 1970s. Photographer unknown. Low res internet version of a publicity still.

Alas, brown hair was only revealed on the left side. More tweaking needed.

Categories
Poetry Uncategorized video

Spring Wind In London by Katherine Mansfield

New Zealand born Katherine Mansfield was as much a free spirit as the wind she describes in this poem.

She mentions the wattle, a tree now grown in temperate climes around the world. The West or northern hemisphere knows it as acacia. It charges forth with an overpowering and unforgettable display of yellow flowers in early spring. For those lucky enough to know it, it lives constantly in our memory.

Mansfield wrote mostly short stories.

Katherine died at 34 of tuberculosis, her health weakened by a persistent social disease now curable at any doctor’s office. A literary lioness brought down by a flea.

Spring Wind In London
by Katherine Mansfield (1888 – 1923)

I blow across the stagnant world,
I blow across the sea,
For me, the sailor’s flag unfurled,
For me, the uprooted tree.
My challenge to the world is hurled;
The world must bow to me.

I drive the clouds across the sky,
I huddle them like sheep;
Merciless shepherd-dog am I
And shepherd-watch I keep.
If in the quiet vales they lie
I blow them up the steep.

Lo! In the tree-tops do I hide,
In every living thing;
On the moon’s yellow wings I glide,
On the wild rose I swing;
On the sea-horse’s back I ride,
And what then do I bring?

And when a little child is ill
I pause, and with my hand
I wave the window curtain’s frill
That he may understand
Outside the wind is blowing still;
…It is a pleasant land.

O stranger in a foreign place,
See what I bring to you.
This rain–is tears upon your face;
I tell you–tell you true
I came from that forgotten place
Where once the wattle grew,–

All the wild sweetness of the flower
Tangled against the wall.
It was that magic, silent hour….
The branches grew so tall
They twined themselves into a bower.
The sun shown… and the fall

Of yellow blossom on the grass!
You feel that golden rain?
Both of you could not hold, alas,
(both of you tried, in vain)
A memory, stranger. So I pass….
It will not come again

—

Beautifully read by Ghizlea Rowe

—

Categories
Poetry Thoughts on writing Uncategorized

She Was a Phantom of Delight by William Wordsworth

Overwrought? Yes, too many times. But Wordsworth saves himself with interesting lines like, “A lovely apparition, sent / To be a moment’s ornament . . .” Who else could turn that phrase?

The text below is taken from the Poetry Foundation’s website. It capitalizes words like Phantom and Twilight and Shape. The hardcopy poetry book that I have, however, does not capitalize these words. My book also places line breaks every nine or ten lines. The Foundation runs all the sentences together.

She Was a Phantom of Delight
by William Wordsworth (1770–1850)

She was a Phantom of delight
When first she gleamed upon my sight;
A lovely Apparition, sent
To be a moment’s ornament;
Her eyes as stars of Twilight fair;
Like Twilight’s, too, her dusky hair;
But all things else about her drawn
From May-time and the cheerful Dawn;
A dancing Shape, an image gay,
To haunt, to startle, and way-lay.

I saw her upon nearer view,
A Spirit, yet a Woman too!
Her household motions light and free,
And steps of virgin-liberty;
A countenance in which did meet
Sweet records, promises as sweet;
A Creature not too bright or good
For human nature’s daily food;
For transient sorrows, simple wiles,
Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.

And now I see with eye serene
The very pulse of the machine;
A Being breathing thoughtful breath,
A Traveller between life and death;
The reason firm, the temperate will,
Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill;
A perfect Woman, nobly planned,
To warn, to comfort, and command;
And yet a Spirit still, and bright
With something of angelic light.

Categories
Poetry Thoughts on writing Uncategorized Writing by others Writing tips

Over the Hill and Over the Dale by John Keats

John Keats died of tuberculosis at 25.

I have his strongest poem here (internal link). But his most famous line is,

“A thing of beauty is a joy forever.”

The epitaph on his grave reads, “Here lies one whose name was writ on water.”

Life tells us to seize the day but Practicality whimpers otherwise.

Keats had few restraints. Or time. Perhaps that best brought out this gifted poet.

Few will ever have the money, time, or blithe disregard to carry out the romantic and sexual impulses that all of us have. Keats did.

Keats didn’t die for his art but rather he lived out his art.

We allow rogues when they are this talented. And this doomed.

Rest in Peace, John Keats.

Over the Hill and Over the Dale

by John Keats (1795 – 1821)

Over the hill and over the dale,
And over the bourn to Dawlish —
Where gingerbread wives have a scanty sale
And gingerbread nuts are smallish.

Rantipole Betty she ran down a hill
And kicked up her petticoats fairly;
Says I I’ll be Jack if you will be Gill —
So she sat on the grass debonairly.

“Here’s somebody coming, here’s somebody coming!”
Says I “Tis the wind at a parley.”
So without any fuss any hawing and humming
She lay on the grass debonairly.

Here’s somebody here and here’s somebody there!
Says I hold your tongue you young gipsy;
So she held her tongue and lay plump and fair
And dead as a Venus tipsy.

O who wouldn’t hie to Dawlish fair,
O who wouldn’t stop in a Meadow,
O [who] would not rumple the daisies there
And make the wild fern for a bed do!

Teignmouth, Spring 1818.

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art editing writing Poetry Uncategorized

An Evil Spirit, Your Beauty, Haunts Me Still, by Michael Drayton

Drayton’s work wears well the dust of centuries.

An Evil Spirit, Your Beauty, Haunts Me Still

by Michael Drayton (1563–1631)

An evil spirit, your beauty, haunts me still,
Wherewith, alas, I have been long possess’d,
Which ceaseth not to tempt me to each ill,
Nor gives me once but one poor minute’s rest.
In me it speaks, whether I sleep or wake;
And when by means to drive it out I try,
With greater torments then it me doth take,
And tortures me in most extremity.
Before my face it lays down my despairs,
And hastes me on unto a sudden death;
Now tempting me to drown myself in tears,
And then in sighing to give up my breath.
Thus am I still provok’d to every evil
By this good-wicked spirit, sweet angel-devil.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Portrait of a Young Venetian Woman by Albrecht Dürer (external link) 1505

More Drayton poetry here:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/michael-drayton (external link)

Categories
Poetry

When Thou Must Home to Shades of Underground By Thomas Campion

When Thou Must Home to Shades of Underground
By Thomas Campion (1567–1620)

When thou must home to shades of underground,
And there arriv’d, a new admired guest,
The beauteous spirits do engirt thee round,
White Iope, blithe Helen, and the rest,
To hear the stories of thy finish’d love
From that smooth tongue whose music hell can move;

Then wilt thou speak of banqueting delights,
Of masques and revels which sweet youth did make,
Of tourneys and great challenges of knights,
And all these triumphs for thy beauty’s sake:
When thou hast told these honours done to thee,
Then tell, O tell, how thou didst murder me.

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Uncategorized video

The Wright Room at the Doubletree Hotel in Tempe, Arizona

Difficult to arrange a tour since the room must be sanitized by a cleaning crew after every visit.

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organizing writing Poetry Uncategorized

I taste a Liquor Never Brewed by Emily Dickinson

I Taste a Liquor Never Brewed

by Emily Dickinson – 1830-1886

I taste a liquor never brewed –
From Tankards scooped in Pearl –
Not all the Frankfort Berries
Yield such an Alcohol!

Inebriate of air – am I –
And Debauchee of Dew –
Reeling – thro’ endless summer days –
From inns of molten Blue –

When “Landlords” turn the drunken Bee
Out of the Foxglove’s door –
When Butterflies – renounce their “drams” –
I shall but drink the more!

Till Seraphs swing their snowy Hats –
And Saints – to windows run –
To see the little Tippler
Leaning against the – Sun!

—

Capitalization and punctuation and verses differ widely with Dickinson’s published poems, depending on whether the original was copied faithfully or edited by someone else for print.

Categories
Poetry Thoughts on writing Uncategorized video Writing by others

That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire and of the Comfort of the Resurrection

That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire and of the Comfort of the Resurrection

by Gerad Manly Hopkins (1844–1889)

https://hopkinspoetry.com (external link)

Cloud-puffball, torn tufts, tossed pillows | flaunt forth, then chevy on an air-
Built thoroughfare: heaven-roysterers, in gay-gangs | they throng; they glitter in marches.
Down roughcast, down dazzling whitewash, | wherever an elm arches,
Shivelights and shadowtackle ín long | lashes lace, lance, and pair.
Delightfully the bright wind boisterous | ropes, wrestles, beats earth bare
Of yestertempest’s creases; | in pool and rut peel parches
Squandering ooze to squeezed | dough, crust, dust; stanches, starches
Squadroned masks and manmarks | treadmire toil there
Footfretted in it. Million-fuelèd, | nature’s bonfire burns on.
But quench her bonniest, dearest | to her, her clearest-selvèd spark
Man, how fast his firedint, | his mark on mind, is gone!
Both are in an unfathomable, all is in an enormous dark
Drowned. O pity and indig | nation! Manshape, that shone
Sheer off, disseveral, a star, | death blots black out; nor mark
Is any of him at all so stark
But vastness blurs and time | beats level. Enough! the Resurrection,
A heart’s-clarion! Away grief’s gasping, | joyless days, dejection.
Across my foundering deck shone
A beacon, an eternal beam. | Flesh fade, and mortal trash
Fall to the residuary worm; | world’s wildfire, leave but ash:
In a flash, at a trumpet crash,
I am all at once what Christ is, | since he was what I am, and
This Jack, joke, poor potsherd, | patch, matchwood, immortal diamond,
Is immortal diamond.

Photo of Hopkins

—
Well done reading, probably by Patrick Kavanagh.

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Uncategorized

On The Death of An Acquaintance

Variations on a Theme

I

On The Death of An Acquaintance

by Oscar Williams (1899–1964)

I read that Williams was a poet and influential anthologist. His name haunted me at first be because I could not place him yet his name was familiar. No, not Oscar Wilde!

Turns out he was a supporter and something of an influence on Dylan Thomas but the other poet hardly acknowledged Williams. There are various accounts of their tumultuous relationship on the web.

I could not find a copy of this on the net so I have typed it out.

The first stanza to me reads poorly and does not hint at what is to come. The line I especially like is, “Now I see you were capable of decision and despair.”

Wow.

Williams also manages to use the very difficult word ‘O’. I’ve never had the chance to use it. Well done.

On The Death of An Acquaintance

Friend, when I think of your delicate feminine face,
And every little hopes common as hearing or seeing,
How singlehanded you moved the massive stone of space
To find a cranny for the flower from the soil of your being,

And how long you manage to keep open in the universe
Under all-tme strain that lighted crack in the reckoning
I am haunted by your grimace O steadily getting worse
Awaiting the vast glad look that reduces everything

For long I thought you another human being in doubt,
One of the millions as ordinary as daylight is everywhere –
One of those usual people that one meets all about –
Now I see you were capable of decision and despair

Forgive me if my heart cringes with those who die,
Forgive me, friend, when even in thought I cannot be brave
Who think of your clear face agonized under tons of sky
Hourly growing more haggard from the weight of the grave.

—