Upsidedownsideup
Upsudedownsideup
Leaves, underwater, above water, reflections, shadows.
Copyright (c) 2015 Bernadette E. Kazmarski
Make a Ripple
Make a difference.
What a gift it was to find this single phlox flower floating on the surface of the birdbath. You’ll see a few more.
This quote is by me.
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Read more about this series of photos.
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All images used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission. Please ask if you are interested in using one in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of this image or a product including this image, check my Etsy shop or Fine Art America profile to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit “purchasing” for availability and terms.
Tiny Perfections
Tiny Perfections.
They are everywhere, these little moments of bliss. Found this one in my birdbath.
This quote is by me.
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Read more about this series of photos.
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All images used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission. Please ask if you are interested in using one in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of this image or a product including this image, check my Etsy shop or Fine Art America profile to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit “purchasing” for availability and terms.
Simplify
Simplify.
After Thoreau. Today my birdbath full of rainwater was my Walden Pond.
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I gave myself a physical and creative break out in the back yard yesterday afternoon. You never know what beauty you’ll find anywhere you go.
I had just wanted to walk around and think about a project I was working on and not be distracted by any other activity, which is what I usually end up doing—take a break from one thing, start another—but it had rained, then stopped, and my Mimi kitty and I would enjoy the air. Typically I take my “good” camera, but determined not to be distracted I took only my smartphone so that I could keep track of time.
Perhaps it was that I had walked out there in a creative state of mind but the place was full of inspiration. It’s just a small back yard, lots of green, not too many flowers after the heat, but I couldn’t decide where to go first. I found one single pink phlox flower that had fallen into a shallow birdbath, and from each angle as I walked around it the view changed, different reflections of the flower, of the tree overhead, of the sky between the leaves, of the mossy concrete below the surface of the water, and magical tiny ripples where the flower rested on the surface of the water, pressing down on the surface tension as if reclining on a transparent mattress.
I prowled around it with my smartphone’s camera as Mimi prowled for the little voles that run right under the leaf litter, each of us aware of each other but focused on our tasks.
Wishing I had all the lenses and quality images I would get from my DSLR—going back into the house would have broken the spell—I pushed that insufficient little phone camera to its limit, and with patience it did not disappoint. I took quite a few photos, several photos that inspired me to crop and edit and add text, which I rarely do, and I shared them on Instagram first, and now here, more to work with later.
So what does this flower have to do with simplifying anyway? It may look like a simple photo, but it’s deceptively complicated, and yet by having only my smartphone to work with I simplified a process which I usually complicate immensely when I run outdoors with all my camera equipment, that’s what it meant for me, and brought to mind Thoreau. Posting a photo that demands one “simplify” isn’t going to convince anyone on the spot, but it may make people stop and consider the idea.
So I got my break, I got creative inspiration to carry back in, and Mimi got her vole. It was very simple.
See two other photos from this magical time, Make a Ripple and Tiny Perfections.
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We’re posting with
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All images used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission. Please ask if you are interested in using one in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of this image or a product including this image, check my Etsy shop or Fine Art America profile to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit “purchasing” for availability and terms.
Rainy Night on Main Street
“Rainy Night on Main Street”, acrylic, 24″ x 12″, 2007 © Bernadette E. Kazmarski
“Rainy Night on Main Street”, Acrylic • 12” W x 24” H • 2007
I pulled up to a stop sign and saw this view of Main Street at night in the rain. I took a photo with my ever-present digital camera (and actually have it in my gallery “At Night in the Rain” ) but at the time a friend had also given me boxes of leftover art materials from her aunt including canvas panels and acrylic paints and brushes. I could visualize this in acrylic paint, the fuzzy glow around the streetlights, the lights in the windows, the long, ragged reflections on the street, and so I did. I entered it in annual the “Carnegie Painted” art exhibit in 2007 and it’s also part of the gallery “My Home Town”, a collection of 12 of my favorite paintings of all the ones I’d entered in that exhibit over nearly a decade. The original painting is sold, but I have made prints of it in various sizes.
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This is shared on Friendship Friday on Create With Joy
Friendship Friday.
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All images used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission. Please ask if you are interested in using one in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of this image or a product including this image, check my Etsy shop or Fine Art America profile to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit “purchasing” for availability and terms.
Poem for a Rainy Day: The World Upside Down
The World Upside Down
The World Upside Down
In the misty turn of a rainy afternoon
a single, ponderous drop of rainwater hangs tenuously from the curved tip of a leaf
holding within the world turned upside down
and a moment later falls into eternity.
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If you look closely you’ll see the maple trees at the edge of my neighbor’s yard upside down inside the droplet.
The World Upside Down ©2011 Bernadette E. Kazmarski
See more photos of rainy days.
Read more poetry here on Today or visit my poetry page to see more about my poetry and other writing, and to purchase Paths I Have Walked.
Paths I Have Walked, collected poems.
I’m proud to offer a folio of my poetry
Paths I Have Walked: the poetry and art of Bernadette E. Kazmarski
FROM FOUR ANNUAL POETRY READINGS AT ANDREW CARNEGIE FREE LIBRARY & MUSIC HALL IN CARNEGIE, PA
People who attended one or more of my poetry readings encouraged me to publish some of my poetry in a book from the beginning.
Once I completed my 2010 poetry reading, my fourth featuring the final piece of artwork in the “Art of the Watershed” series, I decided it was time to publish something and it should be those four poetry readings.
Poetry books are not best-sellers; it’s difficult to convince a publisher to risk effort on a beginning poet, and while self-publishing is the best option it’s not inexpensive and once you’ve got the book, someone’s got to market it. Plus, I’m a graphic designer and I designed books for years, and I want things my way.
All of this is a recipe for a little bit of trouble, but I decided the book was well worth the effort so I designed the book myself and had a set printed—no ISBN or anything formal, but it’s a start! I’m really excited to offer it.
Books are 4.25″ x 11″, 40 pages of information and poetry, with glossy covers featuring “Dusk in the Woods” and little thumbnails of all four pieces in “Art of the Watershed”.
$8.00 each plus $2.50 shipping (they are oversized for mailing first class).
You can order one on my poetry page, or in my Marketplace.
About the books and the poetry readings
My biggest inspiration for poetry, prose and artwork is the world right around me, and I enjoy the opportunity to share it from the perspective of one who walks and hikes and bikes and carries a camera, art materials and journal everywhere—even around the house—so the inspirations are fresh.
In December, 2006, two of my poems were chosen to be published on a section of the Prairie Home Companion website entitled “Stories From Home/First Person” for submissions of writing about the place we feel most familiar. I’m a long-time listener to PHC and reader of Garrison Keillor’s books as well as a daily listener to The Writer’s Almanac featuring news about writers and writing and of interest to writers as well as a poem, all compiled and read by Keillor himself. I was astonished to find my poems were among the first chosen from apparently thousands, and so happy to be able to share them with a potential audience of so many similarly inclined writers and readers.
My poetry readings and art exhibits were the vision of Maggie Forbes, executive director of the Andrew Carnegie Free Library & Music Hall, after learning of my publishing of those two poems. I owe her many thanks for encouraging me to present this combination of my visual and literary art, a first for me. I love that building, every inch of it, and the opportunity to bring people in to visit is an honor.
Reflections of Snowfall
Reflections of Snowfall
Trees and rocks and snow on a the steep banks of the creek; I only wish I’d had my better camera handy since the little one fails me except in bright sunlight.
Reflections Before the Rain, 2011
Reflections Before the Rain
More reflections. As the sun’s angle drops farther toward the horizon and the days grow shorter, reflections are also more clear on reflective surfaces such as water and glass. Even a small puddle will hold a reflection in the darker portion of the year where the sun farther overhead would have shone directly on the surface and either faded or eliminated the reflection.
This was the last bright flash of sun on Chartiers Creek near where I walk.
Doubles, 2011
Reflected Bridge
These concrete bridges and flood walls aren’t really very attractive until they are dressed with the first changing leaves of autumn and a perfect blue evening sky and a nearly perfect mirrored reflection in the still waters of Chartiers Creek.
This bridge is just outside of Canonsburg and will be part of a photo series I’ve been considering compiling into a calendar to benefit watershed and environmental groups along Chartiers Creek entitled “The Bridges of Chartiers Creek”. Exciting stuff, I know, except that as we canoed beneath the many bridges I noticed that each one was different from the next, with some of the oldest train trestles still standing and a variety of other styles and sizes of bridges all up and down the channel. Each of them is a particular style of construction which in itself is very interesting, and in a way, they chronicle the uses of the creek and the surrounding countryside. That’s the real purpose of it, to tell the stories.
Some bridges have been replaced since I began this project. If I take long enough we can all remember these neat bridges.
The World Upside Down
The World Upside Down
In the misty turn of a rainy afternoon
a single, ponderous drop of rainwater hangs tenuously from the curved tip of a leaf
holding within the world turned upside down
and a moment later falls into eternity.
If you look closely you’ll see the maple trees at the edge of my neighbor’s yard upside down inside the droplet.
Reflections Before the Rain
Reflections Before the Rain
More reflections. As the sun’s angle drops farther toward the horizon and the days grow shorter, reflections are also more clear on reflective surfaces such as water and glass. Even a small puddle will hold a reflection in the darker portion of the year where the sun farther overhead would have shone directly on the surface and either faded or eliminated the reflection.
This was the last bright flash of sun on Chartiers Creek near where I walk.
Reflections and Reality
Reflections and Reality
Hard to tell which is which as autumn leaves are both clearly reflected upon and seen through these corner windows of Andrew Carnegie Free Library & Music Hall in Carnegie. A window in its Italianate style, tiny Corinthian column topped by a fountain of familiar symmetrical arches and circle above in terra cotta, warm clay brick in courses and arched above and a cool limestone sill seen in all its detail and color, and also in silhouette through the window, built solid to last a century and counting.
Doubles
Reflected Bridge
These concrete bridges and flood walls aren’t really very attractive until they are dressed with the first changing leaves of autumn and a perfect blue evening sky and a nearly perfect mirrored reflection in the still waters of Chartiers Creek.
This bridge is just outside of Canonsburg and will be part of a photo series I’ve been considering compiling into a calendar to benefit watershed and environmental groups along Chartiers Creek entitled “The Bridges of Chartiers Creek”. Exciting stuff, I know, except that as we canoed beneath the many bridges I noticed that each one was different from the next, with some of the oldest train trestles still standing and a variety of other styles and sizes of bridges all up and down the channel. Each of them is a particular style of construction which in itself is very interesting, and in a way, they chronicle the uses of the creek and the surrounding countryside. That’s the real purpose of it, to tell the stories.
Some bridges have been replaced since I began this project. If I take long enough we can all remember these neat bridges.
The World Upside Down
The World Upside Down
In the misty turn of a rainy afternoon
a single, ponderous drop of rainwater hangs tenuously from the curved tip of a leaf
holding within the world turned upside down
and a moment later falls into eternity.
If you look closely you’ll see the maple trees at the edge of my neighbor’s yard upside down inside the droplet.
Today 