Cold Enough to Cry

It's not that cold here today, but it could be, and has been. No, I am quoting from the poem "Snow, the Lane Home," by Angie Macri, up now in her feature at Escape Into Life. Don't worry, you won't stay cold. The seasons change in her poems, and in the photos by Mahbubur Rahman, which also offer a different geography and terrain, other waters.

The sky is a diffuse cloudy blue-gray here today, and the tall wheat-colored prairie grasses in the ditches are coated with frost. But it's above freezing, and tomorrow it'll go into the 40s, and I may take a long walk into town to the post office to mail a letter to Switzerland. I give myself reasons.

Today I'm still thinking about that desire in us, as writers or as visual artists, to let the work speak for itself. We don't want to have to explain or interpret. But in what ways can we help listeners at a reading, or viewers at an opening or "art talk," perceive the offered works? What little bit of context will ready the hearer for the poem? Or what interesting question can get a viewer looking more closely at a painting or photograph, or seeing something s/he didn't see before?

Is your first impression here of one tree, or of two? Is this a new tree growing from the roots of the old, dead tree? Or is this a young, vibrant tree that sucked up what the old tree needed, killing it? What is it about the rest of the photograph that provides evidence to support you in either impression? Or a third impression?

These are the kinds of simple, natural questions that I like to ask about what I am seeing. It doesn't bother me if someone thinks I am simple, as I know myself to have a side-by-side sophisticated awareness of various things, or the ability to research what I don't know, etc. It doesn't bother me if the photographer turns out to be more interested in how he manipulated light or color, or if the painter is more interested in texture and composition. When I write a poem, I, too, am aware of some formal things going on that are essentially invisible to many readers. As they should be!

But truly, if I look at two trunks in the foreground, I am going to ask the simplest questions about what I am seeing, and wonder why the artist pursued that particular subject matter. My simple questions will cause me to pay attention, look closely, and start to see new things.

I see here a road somewhat traveled. I imagine I will keep walking and won't sit down on that bench.