Robert Simola

Playing Around

2012-01-21T16:04:00.000-08:00

Madonna and Child--As abstract as I get!

5"x7" cherry wood block print on Somerset paper with Daniel Smith black ink.

It's fun to play around with new ways of doing things. Did you know that you can use dish soap to transfer an drawing onto a block? I read about this technique in an old book on printmaking. I decided to try it, and after some wrong turns I got it to work. I painted the block white with some old house paint I had hanging around, and after the paint was dry I coated the block with a fairly thick layer of dish soap and transferred my drawing by putting the drawing face down onto the soaped up block and rubbing it with the back of a spoon. The transfer wasn't perfect, but it was good enough. The trick seems to be and having the block white, using the right amount of soap, and drawing with at least a number 2 pencil. I tried to transfer an image onto grey linoleum but there wasn't enough contrast to be able to see the image good enough to be able to carve it.

I barely scratched the surface with my one millimeter V gouge when hatching and crosshatching because I am trying to learn to carve like an old man and let the tool do the work instead of trying to muscle my way through the wood. And while I need to carve like an old man, I still need to be able to play around like a kid.

Lord of the Skies

2012-01-02T10:19:00.000-08:00

4" x 4" linocut

This is another in my series of experiments to see how much detail I can achieve in a linocut. It is also a failed commission. I was asked to make a falcon for a Christmas card, but after the print was completed, the people changed their minds about using it. Oh well.

Who Done It?

2011-12-09T08:02:00.000-08:00

I love the wrap around cover of this book, and I hate it when this book (or any book) is published without identifying the illustrator. If you know who did the art work for this 1965 edition of The Canterbury Tales, please let me know.

Dive Bomber

2011-11-28T08:40:00.000-08:00

5" x 6" cherry wood block print

At one time there was a hummingbird feeder close to our patio. Things were just fine as long as the feeder was kept full, but if it was empty the hummers would either hover a couple of feet over my head while I was sitting on the patio and yell at me or would engage in aerial acrobatics and behave like miniature dive bombers telling me in no uncertain terms that they were very unhappy their feeder was empty.

My Little Chickadee

2011-11-08T21:26:00.000-08:00

2 3/4" x 2 3/4" linocut with Graphic Chemical Bone Black ink

This is a continuation of my exploration to see how much detail I can achieve with linoleum. So far I have found it to be an interesting experiment.

Storm in the Estuary

2011-11-03T20:47:00.000-07:00

4 3/4" x 2 3/4" wood engraving on South American Boxwood

This abstract is another experiment. This is the first time I have used South American Boxwood; also known as Degame, Yellowwood, and probably a number of other names. The wood does engrave beautifully and has a wonderful yellow color. I played with this as a comparison/companion to the linocut, Night Heron after Bewick.

Night Heron after Bewick

2011-11-01T21:04:00.000-07:00

3"x3" linocut with Graphic Chemical bone black ink

I wanted to see how much detail I could achieve on linoleum using my 1mm V gouge, and this experimental print based on a Thomas Bewick engraving is the result. I guess now I will have to stop saying that I can achieve finer detail on cherry wood or pear wood than I can on linoleum.

Red Hybiscus

2011-09-13T08:55:00.000-07:00

First proof of a 6" x 8" print on Stonehenge paper using rainbow rolls of various Graphic Chemical inks.
The key block is a cherry wood block. Linoleum blocks were used for the colors.

Mirage

2011-09-05T07:52:00.000-07:00

This 6"x6" wood and linocut print for Chaucer's "The Merchant's Tale." In this tale, the marriage of January and May is definitely not a love match. This is one of a series of prints illustrating stories from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.

Mourning Images--Revised

2011-08-29T20:30:00.000-07:00

I have loved the carved, cherry-wood block, but the prints just didn't seem to work I cleaned up the original block and added three more colors carved from linoleum blocks. I like the resultant print much better than the original. I think I am either doing a better job of carving, I am using better tools, or both.

Mourning Images

While silent peacocks simply fade away

into the stubble of the barley field,

it's just a common, early autumn day

with early morning fog. A Stellar jay

is raucous, momentarily revealed,

while silent peacocks simply fade away.

A squirrel in a California bay

chatters at me, then it too is concealed.

It's just a common, early autumn day

and soon the fog will lift. I hear the neigh

of yearlings, (Memories: the past congealed)

while silent peacocks simply fade away.

(The arboretum, brilliant sunlight, May.)

That silent gaping wound has long since healed.

It's just a common, early autumn day.

She would not tell me why she would not stay,

but that's resolved, has long since been annealed;

while silent peacocks simply fade away.

It's just a common, early autumn day.

Agenbite of Inwit -- (In honor of Bloomsday)

2011-06-19T20:57:00.000-07:00

Agenbite (ayenbite) is defined as remorse and this does seem to be the way Joyce used it in Ulysses, but after looking through the Middle English Dictionary I find that “ayen” is an earlier spelling of “again” while “bite” can, along with a rather large number of other meanings, be defined as “the blow of a sharp weapon.” As a result I think “remorse” might be a rather pallid definition for a concept that suggest being beaten again and again; to be beaten over and over.

And while “inwit” does have the meaning of “an inward awareness of right or wrong, conscience,” this is the last definition listed. It was more commonly used as meaning “mind, reason, intellect, comprehension, understanding; and as “soul, spirit, feeling, or disposition.”

But am I saying the same thing if I define the phrase as “remorse of conscience” as I would be if I define it as having a soul or spirit beaten down again and again?

Five or six years is less than a blink of an eye in the overall scheme of things, but when you are wandering around, lost in a dark wood in the middle of your life it certainly seems like a long time.

But what happens when you get to the end of the dark wood? Do you end up facing the sign that tells you to abandon all hope? Do you put your trust in Virgil and stumble along hoping that somewhere, sometime Beatrice will appear and take you to the promised land? Do you find yourself in the land of Odtaa where you continue on because . . . ?
Or do you simply say, "All is well!"

Cherry wood California poppies block

2010-11-24T15:28:00.000-08:00

5"x8" cherry woodblock

The poppies may just be starting to grow at my house, but they are blooming in my studio.

It's been six weeks since I have carved a block using pear wood, and now I know why cherry is used so much more than pear. I will still use pear as soon as the tendonitis goes away in my carving hand, but I will try to not make the same mistake of carving it continuously. In the mean time, cherry is a good substitute.

Ancient of Days

2010-10-09T19:44:00.000-07:00

6"x8" hand colored print on Somerset paper printed with a combination of purple and black Graphic Chemical inks.

A Small, Fierce Dragon

2010-09-27T13:43:00.000-07:00

5 1/2" x 5 1/2" Hand colored woodblock print on Somerset paper
with Graphic Chemical green and black ink.

Reblooming Iris

2010-09-19T08:33:00.000-07:00

6"x6" hand-colored, pear wood block print on Rives BFK paper
with Graphic Chemical Bone Black ink.

Pomagranate

2010-09-03T16:21:00.001-07:00

5 1/2"x5 1/2" pear wood block on Somerset paper
with brown Graphic Chemical ink.
Hand colored

It is getting to the end of the season for fruit around my house. The red Bartlett pears are picked and now there are only pomagranates, Asian pears, and some late ripening apples left on the trees.

It's just Spring

2010-08-27T19:44:00.001-07:00

4"x6" linocut on Somerset paper with vine black Graphic Chemical ink

The quiet of the naked trees release

The spores of pity. Chevrons, white and red,

From blackbirds flash. Mechanicals are still.

Ascending from a silent fairy land

Life groans, gripped by winter that has overstayed

Its times. The ceanothus pushes out

Against a past where Arthur and Sir Gawain

Are holding still beneath the meadow oaks—

Burnt alarums shutter thought, and time

Is needed to release the anger, pain

While redbuds, dogwoods struggle for the sun.

Wait, oppressive, suffocates the hope

That struggles trapped beneath a shattered land.

This print and poem are for an artists' book on war and peace
being put together by the Central Coast Printmakers.

Late Alberta Peaches

2010-08-24T12:51:00.001-07:00

4"x8" pear wood block on Somerset paper with Graphic Chemical ink.
Embossed and hand colored.

Adding a little veridian green to brown seems to result in a black print rather than a greenish-brown print. It looked the way I wanted it too when I pulled the prints, but they dried black. I wonder if adding some extender will give me the effect I want.

An Italian Green Man

2010-08-15T19:26:00.000-07:00

8"x12" hand colored wood block print on BFK Rives paper.

This print is for an upcoming exhibit, "Who Do We Think We Are?" at the Studios on the Park in Paso Robles. This is my first print using Swiss pear wood for the block. I have been looking for pear wood for years, and now I have a five to ten year supply. It is denser than cherry and carves beautifully because it holds a line superbly and cleanly. After using it for this print, I can understand why it is the preferred wood for block prints.

On a personal note, I only have to become a toxic chemical dump three more times! Life is good.

A Season of Renewal

2010-04-02T16:48:00.000-07:00

At my house California poppies and lupin are competing for pride of place, but no matter which wins, I do. One of my favorite combinations of colors are orange/gold and purple. And while January first may be the official start of the new year, the new year starts for me when the wild flowers start to appear and the fruit trees are full of blossoms promising a bountiful harvest in the late summer and fall.

This year I have more reasons than most for the promises of life. I am still here to see the spring, and thanks to an amazing surgeon at the USC Cancer Center, I have every reason to expect to be around for a good, long time.

It has been too long since I have been able to work in my studio, but I finally have an idea for my next print. It will be the fourth in my series on changing seasons. Now all I have to do is try to make the reality match the vision.

The Great Gadfly

2009-12-12T19:20:00.000-08:00

If ekphrastic poetry is poetry that interprets a work of visual art, then what is a piece of visual art called that interprets a poem? And is it a lack of imagination that makes it easier for me to come up with images for a poem than it is for me to come up with a poem that describes an image? And since it is easier to visualize what has been written, why haven't I got something that will illustrate "The Great Gadfly"? Marshmellow cows and milkmaids seem like they should be fairly straight forward and easy. Perhaps it's the gadfly flitting around refusing to be pinned down to just one thing, and I will have to wait until he is truly an ancient-of-days grumpy and querulous and hobbling around with a cane before I can capture his image. Here is the poem:

Great is the gadfly giggling the milkmaid
Bliddle bliddle crug on a three legged stool.
Blah crug bliddle bliddle blah bliddle blah
Bliddle blop crug bliddle bliddle blop bliddle blop.
Milking mooing marshmallows, blah crug bliddle
With a gadfly walking on the ground bliddle bliddle blop.
Marshmallow milk in the pail blop crug bliddle;
Milkmaid tapping to the crug bliddle bliddle bliddle;
Gadfly blah crug blop bliddle bliddle blop
Tickling the marshmallow cows bliddle blop.
Great is the gadfly giggling the milkmaid
Bliddle bliddle crug on a three legged stool.
Great is the gadlfy tickling the moo cow
Blah crug bliddle bliddle blah bliddle blah.
Blah crug bliddle bliddle blah bliddle blah.

Blue and White Iris

2009-12-04T20:20:00.000-08:00

8"x8" oil on canvas--$150

The last of the autumn irises have finally finished blooming with the coming of December, but today I noticed blooms on the lilac and the forsythia. There are only a few blooms, but at this time of the year both should be totally dormant. I hope this doesn't mean there won't be a glorious show from them in the spring.

2009 Christmas

2009-11-30T09:20:00.001-08:00

5"x4" engraving on Resingrave with Graphic Chemical vine black ink on Stonehenge paper
Framed $185

This is the Christmas card I will be giving to patrons as a thank you for the support they have given me. It was an experiment that kind of got out of hand, and I hope they don't expect anything as detailed and complicated every year. It started out as a wreath that morphed into a stylized tree and then into a practice piece . . . and then . . . . I guess it's true that if you give a mouse a cookie . . . .

Maroon and yellow iris

2009-11-23T23:55:00.001-08:00

8" x 8" oil on canvas--$150

When we bought our house, Lucy and I decided that we would only have edible plants. At that time our idea of edible plants were things like fruit trees, herbs, vegetables, and edible flowers. Now our idea of edible has been extended to include plants that are food for the soul. Irises are in this category. . . especially irises that bloom more than once a year. Thanksgiving is only two days away, and I give thanks that there are still irises blooming around our house.

Yellow Iris

2009-11-10T18:32:00.001-08:00

8"x8" oil on canvas -- Sold to a private collector

It's November and we have already had several nights of frost and still my irises insist on blooming. Fortunately no one has ever told them the facts of life. No one has told them they are only suppose to bloom in the spring or that they can't bloom if I never separate their clumps so that there are fifty to a hundred irises growing in each square foot of space. Nor have they ever been told the deer and the gophers will decimate them. They don't mope or whine about never being fertilized or sprayed for protection against insects or diseases. All they do is bloom where they are planted and make the world a better, more beautiful place.

Zebrina

2009-11-04T19:26:00.000-08:00

8"X8" oil on canvas--$150

Zebrinas are a cultivar of Malva sylvestris. Last year I started a handfull of plants from seed, and this year I had dozens of plants scattered throughout my accidental forest. It has made itself a place beside the coreopsis, nasturtiums, four-o’clocks, irises, day lilies, California poppies, and alyssum. Like them, it multiplies and grows exuberantly without any help from me.

Brown-eyed Susans--Changing Seasons #2

2009-10-11T19:28:00.000-07:00

5" X 7" cherrywood block print on Stonehenge paper with Graphic Chemical vine black ink.
Framed $135

Winter may have arrived in other places, but at my house the weather hasn't made up its mind about which season we are in. One week it is the middle of summer and 107 degrees, and the next week the nights are close to freezing. The calendulas are blooming like it is the beginning of spring while the Brown-eyed Susans are wondering if they should keep up with their neighbors or be finished for the year.

Nasturtiums

2009-10-08T20:55:00.000-07:00

8" X 8" oil on canvas--$150

I used to think filberts only came in a can of mixed nuts. Now I think I was a mixed nut not to use them before.

Chinese four o'clock

2009-09-27T21:44:00.000-07:00

8" X " oil on canvas--$150

My Chinese four o'clocks came from seed a Chinese exchange student sent me about fifteen years ago. They are totally satisfactory. Neither gophers, nor deer, nor ground squirrels, nor any other pest seems to like them while hummingbirds think they have died and gone to heaven when the flowers are in bloom. The flowers even bloom on Chinese time. While other four o'clocks are supposed to open at around four in the afternoon and bloom all night, these plants open their flowers the first thing in the morning and keep them open until about four in the afternoon.

Taken from the Hana Highway

2009-09-25T19:14:00.001-07:00

8" X 8" oil on canvas--$150

If I was a real environmentalist I would not only agree with but passionately espouse and defend the idea that when we are visiting beautiful places like the Hana Highway in Maui we should take only pictures and leave only footprints. Unfortunately I'm afraid I have to disagree. There are, and should be, loop holes that must be taken advantage of. And even though I am accused of acting like Attila the Hun and engaging in scourge-of-the-earth behavior, more than just photographs sometimes demand to be taken. After all, how does it diminish the Hana Highway or any natural wonder if a painting or sculpture or some other piece of art is taken away?

"Ah!" you say. "What if it is a lousy painting or a cruddy sculpture?"

"Well then," I say, "the environmentalists should trip over themselves singing the artist's praises because those who look at that piece of tripe might think the original source equally without merit and so stay away."

So take away, take away everything you can when you are on vacation, and help save and beautify the earth.

Who knew Chaucer could be such a bully?

2009-09-18T13:49:00.000-07:00

My forlorn prints sit overshadowed by un-shelved and un-cataloged piles of various editions of Chaucer’s works. I had always thought of Chaucer as being the kindest and gentlest of men, and yet here I sit surrounded by malevolent books accusing me of being a dilettante with Chaucer’s ghost hovering in disapproval pointing at me in righteous anger while saying, “I know Chaucerians. Chaucerians are friends of mine, and you’re no Chaucerian! You don’t even deserve to be called a bibliophile. And as for being a collector, it would be more accurate to call you a pack rat. Look at this mess. Do you even know what you have? Faded baubles collecting dust are all they are to you. Shape this midden into a collection or I’m cutting you off. You’ll never win another auction, and every time you try to buy another edition someone else will have already bought it. Shape up Simola, and shape up this mess before a real Chaucerian comes knocking on your door!"

Who knew Chaucer could be such a bully?

Iris Study #1--First State

2009-09-16T21:01:00.000-07:00

4" x 5" wood engraving on Stonehenge paper
with Graphic Chemical Bone Black ink

After just fifty years of carving, I finally have a tool that will actually put that mythical razor-sharp edge on my carving tools. My gravers cut much better when they have been polished with the 3600 sandpaper on my new Work Sharp machine.

It may be the wrong time of year to start a series of iris engravings, but I have some iris drawings in my sketch book, and there are actually some irises blooming in the garden at the end of our driveway, and if I am quick I will be able to gather some more drawings before they remember it's fall and not spring. And if I'm not quick about gathering their images, then my projected series of iris prints may find themselves waiting for spring.

Queequeg Redux

2009-09-06T08:30:00.000-07:00

4" x 5" wood engraving on Stonehenge paper with
Graphic Chemical Bone black ink

So here I am with a second engraving, the first since I took the wood engraving workshop with Rik Olson, and not only is it not perfect, it’s a mess. It’s a disaster. It didn't come out anything like it was supposed to. If Elizabeth Barrett Browning will excuse me, “How did I screw up? Let me count the ways.” How can it be that I am not perfect when I’ve done this once before? I am eating worms and have a permanent case of the grumbles!

Oh well. At least I don’t have to go out and spend money on bigger hats to fit a swelled head. And there are benefits even to disasters. I am pretty sure I can do better next time. After all, what if I had really created a masterpiece? I would have had to throw away or give away all my brand new engraving tools because I would be certain I would never be able to create another engraving as good. Now I can talk about my incremental improvement and force people to look at one good line out of an entirely poorly cut block and have them say, “Oh. I see. Yes. That is very good.” while they neither see nor care to see what it is I am talking about and while they are thinking, “How can I escape? Get me out of here! Where did this bore-of-the-month come from?”

And I have learned a great deal from this piece. Although I keep hearing from people that I should set up an outline on the block and leave room for embellishments and spontaneity when carving, I think it works better for me to plan everything out ahead of time. After all, using a little bit of an eraser is much cheaper and less frustrating than ruining another block. I’ve learned that even rock maple has soft spots, and less is more when it comes to pressure. I’ve learned that with a little less force, the gravers slide through the wood more easily, and the block will still print when I don’t try to dig the tool deeply into the wood.

So I think, over all, my failure was a success after all; and I can get started on my next practice piece.

My Best Ever Engraving

2009-08-27T21:22:00.000-07:00

3" x 5" wood block engraving

The Center for the Book in San Francisco offered another wonderful class last weekend. This time it was a class in wood engraving with Rik Olson as the instructor. Rik is an absolutely first-rate instructor, and I have been assured that I can be just as good as he is if I only work at my engraving every day for the next forty years. This is the print I was able to complete during the workshop. It is without a doubt the best engraving I have ever done!

I have ordered a bunch of engraving tools, and I am waiting very impatiently for them to arrive so I can start work on another engraving.

Queequeg

2009-08-22T13:21:00.000-07:00

The beat, beat, beat of music disregarded.

Ash cans, broken drums and cigarettes

Replete, repeatedly the appetites

Of Queequegs pale and balding—filed minds

Intense and dangerous; and underneath

The murmurings, the suppurating sounds

Of discontent. Stick-thin predators pray

The country comes to jesus. Jesus Christ.

The Loathly Lady

2009-08-21T19:43:00.001-07:00

5" x 7" cherrywood block print on Somerset with
Graphic Chemical vine black ink
Framed $135

In “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales a knight rapes a young woman and is sentenced to death for his action unless he can find out what it is that women really want. Eventually the knight finds a “loathly lady” who promises to tell him what women really want if he will marry her. He makes and keeps his promise, and on their wedding night this “loathly lady” appears to him as a beautiful young woman with a proposition. The knight can either have her as a beautiful young woman when they are alone at night and be loathly to everyone who sees her during the day, or she can be beautiful for all to see during the day and be loathly to him at night. The knight can’t make a decision and finally decided to let her decide for herself. This is the right answer because according to the Wife of Bath what women really want is to have mastery over themselves. They want to be the deciders. And as a result of letting her decide her own fate, the “loathly lady” stays young and beautiful both during the day and at night.

I have always found this tale to be problematic and full of questions I can find no answers for no matter how often I read the story: Why is the knight ultimately rewarded for his loathsome act at the beginning of the story? Is the “Loathly Lady” the same person as the young maiden who was raped by the knight? Was the “Loathly Lady” only loathly because of her class and not because of her looks so that upon marriage she only looks different to the knight and the court because her marriage has transformed her from one class to another? And where does the Wife of Bath fit into all this? Is she a loathly lady herself because of her age and because she is a widow, and will she undergo a similar transformation from loathed to respected when she is able to capture her sixth husband?

Changing Seasons—1

2009-07-07T20:14:00.000-07:00

5" x 7" woodblock print on Stonehenge paper
with Graphic Chemical ink.
Framed $135

Ecclesiastes, Pete Seegar, The Byrds, and Bob Dylan, all tell us there is a season for everything. What they don’t tell us is how long a season lasts before it changes. The post-modern mindset would shrug and respond, “Who’s to say?” as if there is no real answer to the question or that any answer is as good as any other because there an impossibility of coming up with a definitive answer. But since we are supposed to be in a post-post modern period, perhaps it is possible to come up with an answer for this lily of the field. What are the ways its bloom is as ephemeral as the flower that generated its design? Has paper and ink changed the length of its season?

And changing to another subject, I was recently introduced to Weebly.com and decided that not only would I have a blog, I would have a (possibly never finished) web site at: http://robertsimola.weebly.com/

So even though I don't Twitter and I don't know how my Facebook page works, or even how to access it, perhaps I am not really a troglodyte or even a candidate for the Flat Earth Society.

If April showers bring May flowers, what does a June rain bring?

2009-06-05T09:01:00.000-07:00

Katy dancing with her bear

It was raining last night. For those who do not live in Southern California, a little rain in June won’t seem like any big deal, but since I live in an area that does not usually get any measurable rain between April and November it is a wonderful way to start the day. The day got even better when I got a call that my print, “October Afternoon” was one of three prints to sell at the Santa Barbara Printmaker’s Ojai Show. So today I’m playing the piano--something I usually do very badly, planting flowers--even if planting season is supposed to be over, and pulling prints that will register properly. I’m on a roll! The Solstice Exchange group even chose my print, “A Naked Maja” as the best print of their last exchange.

The wailing and complaining, the whining and the gnashing of teeth, the moans and groans, and the eating of worms are going to have to take a number and wait. There is nothing I can complain about today.

Chaucer portrait

2009-05-24T09:25:00.000-07:00

As a Chaucer collector I sometimes find unusual and unknown (to me) objects related to Chaucer or his works. A recent acquisition in this category is a nineteenth century painting purported to be of Chaucer by an unknown artist. I have been able to find nothing about it. If you are familiar with this painting and can tell me anything about it I would appreciate it very much.

Carving up my new floor

2009-05-17T17:34:00.000-07:00

My new floor has a tree growing out of it . . . or at least that’s what I’m telling people. Actually my new, vinyl floor is still sitting in boxes waiting for it to be installed. But since I got more flooring than I will need for my studio, I decided to use some of it for a print of the curly willow growing right outside. This is an experiment since I have never made a print from vinyl blocks nor made a print using multiple blocks, but the benefit of doing something brand new outweighs the risks. This will be the best print with multiple colors and the best print made from vinyl I will have ever done, and how often does anyone get to honestly say that something is the best they've ever done?

From a subjective viewpoint, I think vinyl is a little harder to carve than linoleum and (except for its homogenous, grain-free nature) about the same as carving cherry wood.

An Elegant Solution

2009-04-19T14:26:00.000-07:00

In my little studio space is at a premium. I have just about everything on wheels so I can move them about. But having things on wheels didn't save space when it came to drying prints. I would either have the prints covering every available horizontal surface or hanging from a clothes line I had stretched inside the studio. Neither was a very elegant solution. Then I visited the studio belonging to a member of our local printmaking group, and I stole her idea.

I went to Home Depot and bought the materials for making window screens from scratch and made a number of screens sized to fit an empty cabinet. I had never made or repaired a window screen before, so I wasn't sure I would be able to do it. Fortunately the only tools required were a hacksaw and a spline tool that I bought with the screening material. And while the screens are not all prefect, they are more than good enough for my needs. Now my prints they are out of the way, and I can work on other projects while they are drying.

Yosemite in Early April

2009-04-10T09:10:00.001-07:00

There isn't a bad time to visit Yosemite, but early April has to be one of the best times. Highway 140 from Merced to Yosemite runs along the Merced River.

As you approach the valley, it is lined with purple lupine and California Red Bud trees in glorious bloom. The weather is changable, so what is Springtime, shirt-sleeve weather one day can be followed by a snow storm the next. But if you are prepared for snow, you can have the entire valley practically to yourselves.

This is in the center of Curry Village. It can make you feel you are at Disneyland rather than in a national park because of the crowds, but when it snows, even Curry Village is practically empty.

The best accommodation in Curry Village, and possibly in all of Yosemite, is Cabin 819. When my wife and I were young and poor, we spent our honeymoon in a tent cabin with twin beds, no heat, and a bathroom down the lane. For our thirty-fifth anniversary we stayed in Cabin 819. Not only does it have a bathroom, it also has central heating, a king-sized bed in the bedroom, and a living room with a fireplace big enough to roast a pig; and if you think you might ever get bored, bring your DVDs because there are flat screen televisions and DVD players in both the living room and the bedroom. When we made reservations, we didn't know about Cabin 819. We just took what was available. Glorious!

At a Terrace Table

2009-03-05T10:31:00.001-08:00

5" x 7" cherry wood block print
with Graphic Chemical bone black ink
on Somerset paper

As I look over the prints I have done in the last year, I keep trying to see if they create a body of work that meet the "cohesive" criteria of the California Society of Printmakers. So far the answer I keep coming up with is no, they are not cohesive. My goal has been to illustrate the respective poems to which each print is attached, and for some reason, even though the subject matter of each print is a woman's face, the prints seem to me to be to stylistically diverse to be cohesive. So what makes a body of work "cohesive"? Is it style? subject matter? size? technique? all the above? some of the above? none of the above? And if ekphrastic poetry is poetry based on an art work, what is an art work that is based on a poem called?

At a Terrace Table

The candle flame, fractured in the cut-glass urn,

was slowly drowning in the molten wax.

Her fingers twirled a strand of auburn hair

that had spun a spider's web of softness

at her neck. "I just don't know what you want.

I don't know how you want me to reply."

She looked at him a little longer. "You

have made it very difficult for me."

She paused a moment, staring at the flame;

and through reflections in the window pane

she saw the rusted iron lily by

the pond and saw her blackened hands gesture.

"You just don't know how hard it is for me.

I wish you'd understand."

The goldfish gasped

for air and swam in aimless circles in

the algae covered pond. Transparent hands

began to smooth the linen table cloth.

On the Mendecino Coast

2009-02-03T09:26:00.000-08:00

5" x 7" cherry wood block print on Somerset paper
with Graphic Chemical vine black ink

A tangled wildness was choking out

the Iceland poppies she had set in rows

along the peeling, yellow picket fence.

She sat beneath the tree and thought about

the years she'd fought those weeds and all the hoes

she'd bought. Whatever for?

If she'd the sense

of weeds and worms, she would have left them all

alone and saved herself the work. With him,

she could have sat beneath that weeping oak

and watched those wild weeds grow strong and tall

each spring and ripen in the summer.

Tim

could laugh away the world. It was a joke

to him, and he could laugh at everything

the world contained. He'd laugh at her out there

with dirty hands and knees and she would yell,

"You're good for nothing. That you are." and fling

a clod of dirt at him.

He didn't care

if he was hit, but if he was he'd tell

her, "For a little gal, you've quite an arm."

and they would banter back and forth and then

he'd smile and call her something special, and

it wouldn't matter what he did.

What harm

was there in all his life? It's just, some men

aren't meant to be a rock. Some men are sand.

first published in The Newvictorian

Crisis of Confidence

2009-01-28T20:16:00.001-08:00

For my most recent wood block I suffered a crisis of confidence. Knowing I have no real artistic background, that the embarrassingly few art classes I have taken have been scattered through and separated by decades, and with the vision in my right eye wobbling between almost usable and looking out through an impenetrable fog, I decided to trace the image I was planning on using as the basis of my next print. I found the result illuminating. While the tracing bears a nodding similarity to the original image, it also looked like the death mask of a cadaver. But most importantly, the tracing didn’t capture the underlying sadness I wanted the finished print to express.

And now that I didn’t cough nor the surgeon sneeze at a critical time, that there wasn’t an earthquake during the surgery, that a meteor didn’t come from outer space and crash into a power pole right outside the surgery center causing the electricity to go off, that there were neither fire ants nor scorpions biting either me or the surgeon, and I can actually see again, I have a drawing I am happy with instead of a tracing that made me feel like a cheat.

So, some valuable lessons: Short cuts take more time, and The Code of the West still holds true. “Cheaters never prosper. Square shooters always win!”

Morning Images

2008-12-23T20:59:00.000-08:00

5" x 7" cherrywood block print on Somerset paper
with Graphic Chemical vine black in.

Morning Images

While silent peacocks simply fade away

into the stubble of the barley field,

it's just a common, early autumn day

with early morning fog. A Stellar jay

is raucous, momentarily revealed,

while silent peacocks simply fade away.

A squirrel in a California bay

chatters at me, then it too is concealed.

It's just a common, early autumn day

and soon the fog will lift. I hear the neigh

of yearlings, (Memories: the past congealed)

while silent peacocks simply fade away.

(The arboretum, brilliant sunlight, May.)

That silent gaping wound has long since healed.

It's just a common, early autumn day.

She would not tell me why she would not stay,

but that's resolved, has long since been annealed;

while silent peacocks simply fade away.

It's just a common, early autumn day.

Naked Maja

2008-12-16T21:39:00.001-08:00

5" x 7" cherrywood block print on Somerset
with Graphic Chemical vine black ink.

Naked Maja

The alcove hidden underneath the stair

was now her home. She'd placed a narrow bed

against the kitchen wall and she would sleep

surrounded by her mirrors.

Daddy took

the picture. They were staying at the beach

the day she would have graduated. She's

reclining on a beach towel with her right

hand shading out the sun. "You've got the air

of Madame Fauntleroy," her father said,

"and carry on with every no good creep.

You got to settle down; become a cook,

or something steady, sure."

III

She held a peach

between her teeth and grinned at him. The trees

behind her held their future. "We just might

be in the clear this year. If we take care

of them, they'll care for us. Just tilt your head

a little to the side. You are too deep

in shadow. Catch the sun." It seemed a hook

would always jerk the future from her reach

when it was in her grasp. A late Spring freeze

destroyed the crop.

She quickly stole a bite

of cheesecake and she giggled. Would he dare

to tell her once again she moved her head?

She'd laughed and threatened, "Take a flying leap!

I'll eat or you can paint another. Look,

you know the meaning of the phrase, 'To each

his own?'" She laughed at him. The Summer breeze

was soft on naked skin, and in that light

she felt resplendent.

Pinning up her hair

for bed, she listened while her husband fed

himself and climbed the stair. She pushed a heap

of unwashed clothes, her curling iron and book

on to the floor. Too bad you couldn't teach

me Daddy. Guess I just can't seem to please

anyone. Good night my dear, good night.

October Afternoon

2008-12-06T16:12:00.001-08:00

5" x 7" cherry wood block print on Somerset
with Graphic Chemical bone-black ink.

October afternoon, and still I wait

For you to re-appear. “It isn’t fair.”

You told me. “Why am I the only one

To have to suffer?” Silently, I want

Exploding stars, and black volcanic ash

To cover up the world. Instead I get

The northern lights and melancholy whales,

Spring flowers growing in the cracked-clay dirt,

And ruby-throated hummingbirds, and bees.

Whatever happened? In a thoughtless world

The rainbows are supposed to all turn grey

While scorpions of frightful size attack.

Guitars and salsa music shouldn’t play,

Are inappropriate unless they’re played

With broken strings.

But nothing, nothing’s changed.

At Samuel P. Taylor State Park

2008-12-02T17:10:00.001-08:00

5" x 7" cherry wood print on Somerset paper
with Graphic Chemical Vine Black Ink

My husband, if he comes, will bring raw milk.

The stuff they sell in stores I wouldn't feed

our pigs. We're renting; sort of like a work

exchange. We only have a hundred head

and they belong to Mr. Peterson.

But all the calves are ours. He only wants

the milk and us to keep the place until

it's sold. I hope it doesn't bother you

to look at me; but while I'm camping, well

it hurts to wear my wig. My husband bought

it. See, my hair just doesn't seem to grow

as quickly over steel as over bone.

The doctor said I was suppose to stay

in bed; but bed is boring, lonely too;

so I convinced my husband I could rest

while camping just as well as I could rest

at home. We spent our honeymoon right here.

I hadn't camped before but with the cost

of everything and being out of work,

my husband thought that this would be the best

that we could do. And as it happened, he

was right. We camped beside the stream. I loved

the time we were together, here. You sure

it doesn't bother you to look at me?

Christmas 2008

2008-11-25T15:34:00.001-08:00

-After a wood engraving by John Gilbert-

5" x 7" cherrywood block print on Somerset paper
with Graphic Chemical Bone-black ink.

Thanksgiving is still two days away, and already I have a finished
print for the Christmas cards I will be sending to family, friends,
and those who bought a print during the year. Perhaps this year
I will even start my Christmas shopping before Christmas eve!

Marie

2008-11-23T14:19:00.000-08:00

5" x 7" on Somerset paper with Graphic Chemical Bone Black Ink.
The print was then hand colored with acrylic paint.

(I haven't decided whether I like the black and white version
or the painted version better.)

Marie

for Jo-Ellen Truelove

You know my Joey, he's a little man.

He wouldn't even make a third of me.

Well he was jabbing at me, going on

about utilities, about the lights

and water and the phone.

"Marie," he said,

"ya gotta shut your mouth. Your sister lives

in Maine. She isn't living down the street."

As if I didn't know where Linda lives.

He stuck his bony finger in my face

and yelled about the bills. I hate it when

he pokes that bony finger in my face.

His face was red. "A bony lobster." That's

my name for him. He hates it when I call

him that. "Well Bony, why don't you just pay

the bills and quit complaining. You're at fault

as much as me." I told him.

Lobster red

he was. His mouth was working up a fit

and that old bony finger jabbed away

a whisker from my nose. I said to him

I couldn't hear a word he said. And then

I said, "I gotta make some water for

your bills." and went to piss.

I hadn't just

got seated, he had left the cover up

again, when there he was a jabbering

away. Well what do you expect a girl

to do? There wasn't any way he'd give

me any peace. I couldn't even piss

in peace. So sitting there, my dress all bunched

around my waist, I let him have it.

just bounced into the shower where he knocked

the curtain from the wall and landed there

surrounded by that plastic organdy

he's always after me to throw away.

American Craftsmanship

2008-11-08T20:55:00.000-08:00

5" x 7" cherry wood block print on Somerset paper
with Graphic Chemical intense black ink

American Craftsmanship

The basket's under glass surrounded by

security and lights and other works

produced by primitive Americans.

It's bottom, tight enough for acorn mush,

flares out into a willow filigree,

a lazy-squaw stitch making up the sides;

and red bud strips are woven at the top

to form a geometrical design.

The gallery is carpeted in gray;

the walls are egg shell white. Ladies dressed

from Nordstroms quietly converse about

proportion, color, line, simplicity.

Helicopters with their booms extended

spray the marsh and river for mosquitoes.

The women take the year old willow wands

and split them with their teeth in perfect thirds

and try to teach their daughters how to weave

traditional designs with shaking hands.

Blue Eyes

2008-11-03T15:28:00.001-08:00

5" x 7" cherry wood block print on Somerset paper
with Graphic Chemical intense black ink.

Blue Eyes

Our eyes sparkled when

we made a list of blue eyes

laughing in the sun:

Popeye-food growing in rows

on a cow-munching hillside.

Strawberry Jell-O for midnight snack.

Proserpine's biceps bulging.

Einstein smiling, sticking his tongue out.

The Laöcoon.

Popocatepetl!

Popocatepetl?

Your crystalline eyes wait

patiently, watching the kitchen clock

take its measured meaningless time.

When did our laughter cease?

Blue eyes no longer lie in wait

For gap toothed hags to

spring.

All Hallows Eve and Independence Day

are merely holidays with crystal nights

and gray eyed girls in pinafores and

steel eyed men in worsted

suits populate the world.

Rainbow's End

2008-10-08T15:23:00.001-07:00

This 5" x 7" woodblock print is on Somerset paper
using Graphic Chemical Bone Black Ink, then
hand colored with acrylic paint.

In Geoffrey Chaucer’s “The Pardoner’s Tale” three wastrels are looking for death when they find an old man who tells them where death is to be found. When they get there, they think they have found the proverbial pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. But the old man was telling them the truth. What they found was their own deaths.

Rainbow's End

The glitter, glitter, glitter overwhelms

The rainbow. Dawn and gold and promises

Are disregarded. Metaphoric pearls

Are egg shells shattered, ground into the dust.

Emerald leaves have turned a sickly green,

And rusted rubies scattered in the dirt

Command disintegrated thoughts and dreams.

Though rain-fresh webs connect the future, joy

Is tarnished. Redolent with springtime, life

Is hidden by illusion. Darkness reigns.

Michael Botts

2008-09-30T08:36:00.001-07:00

5" x 7" Woodblock print on Somerset paper
with Graphic Chemical Bone Black Ink

Sit on a kumquat, Michael Botts?

Rivers of chryselephantine,

kumquats and natural springs

are meant for better things.

Joust with dragonflies at night

by glow worm light.

Play milkweed flutes.

Fly dragon kites.

A storm blows out of the mouth of the sun

like butterflies out of a dragon's throat,

and butterflies drop on the leaves of the trees

till the trees are covered in purple and gold.

Caterpillars eat the moon.

The road grows scales and wings

and flies back into the sun.

Under a mushroom Penelope waits

for the rain to stop and for you to come

and butterflies rest themselves in her hair.

And still you sit there, Michael Botts?

--Ship of Fools and In Raspberry Gulch--

Rosalind

2008-09-30T08:27:00.001-07:00

5" x 7" Woodblock print on Somerset paper
with Graphic Chemical bone black ink, then
hand colored with acrylic paint.

Her soiled satin pumps are out of place,

transparent images in window glass.

She moves along the rain-washed concrete walk

and gently twirls her single gillyflower.

She's Rosalind. Carnations are for other

days and times. The paper banners screaming,

"SALE! MARKDOWNS UP TO 35%!";

the clothes; the jewelry carefully arranged

on hairless, alabaster mannequins;

the New York style deli: neon, pink

and purple spelling intermittently

PASTRAMI; Canon's auto-everything;

Danielle Steele; all are disregarded as

she smells her flower absent-mindedly

and softly uses it to stroke her neck.

— Coffeehouse Poets Quarterly

Chinese four o'clock

2008-08-18T09:48:00.001-07:00

5" x 7" block print on Somerset paper with Graphic Chemical intense black ink and oil paint. The carved areas of the block were hand painted and then the surface of the block inked before the block was run through the press.

My Chinese four o'clocks grow to over six-feet tall. They open in the morning and bloom all day before closing at around four o'clock in the afternoon.

It's just Spring

2008-05-29T09:10:00.000-07:00

The quiet of the naked trees release

The spores of pity. Chevrons, white and red,

From blackbirds flash. Mechanicals are still.

Ascending from a silent fairy land

Life groans, gripped by winter that has overstayed

It’s times. The ceanothus pushes out

Against a past where Arthur and Sir Gawain

Are holding still beneath the meadow oaks—

Burnt alarums shutter thought and time

Is needed to release the anger, pain

While redbuds, dogwoods struggle for the sun.

Wait, oppressive, suffocates the hope

That struggles trapped beneath a shattered land.

2008 Tour dei Simola

2008-05-25T13:32:00.000-07:00

16" x 20" oil on canvas

Walter and Griselda

2008-05-21T17:22:00.001-07:00

5" x 7" linocut on Somerset paper with black Graphic Chemical ink.

In the Punjab at the Zoo

2008-05-17T17:10:00.001-07:00

The Punjab of the Zoo

In the Punjab grey-haired tigers roar unheard

And elephants are swinging by their tales.

“Remember when the coronets were herding

Sharps and Flats into the water hole

Where they attacked the muddy, clashing teeth?”

Ponderously pound, pound the words themselves

To mash, mush for toothless minds to trumpet

Thoughtless crumpets, crippled by design—

Staggering around with thoughtless minds maimed

By alcohol and academic”

“Stop!

“Butterflies are feeding. Floating danger’s

sucking out the meaning, understanding, myth.”

Philofiles, sophistry, delightful obfuscations

Coruscate, reverberate, reverberate, re . . . .

The Woodcarver

2008-04-25T09:51:00.000-07:00

5” x 5” print carved from cherry wood and printed on Somerset paper with Graphic Chemical Intense Black ink.

It seems to me a carver’s hands and tools work independently of the wood carver's brain. I wanted this print to express this feeling by only suggesting a face emerging out of the wood the carver is working on.

Helen of Troy

2008-02-27T21:17:00.000-08:00

This is my first cherry wood block. It is 5" x 7".

The print is on Somerset paper with vine black Graphic Chemical ink.

The real causative factors of the Trojan War are now forgotten and meaningless to us. And while Helen may not have been the real reason the Greeks launched a thousand ships and burnt the topless towers of Ilium, she is the reason that remains. Achilles is dead, Hector all but forgotten, and Odysseus is a myth who wanders foot-sore and alone through unknown countries with hope abandoned that someone will mistake his oar for a winnowing fan and he can finally find peace. Helen has been blamed, castigated, treated as if she were no better than prostitute; and in spite of everything, for more than three-thousand years, the daughter of Zeus remains towering over the Trojan War. Shakespeare could have been speaking of her instead of Cleopatra when he wrote:

Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale

Her infinite variety; other women cloy

The appetites they feed, but she makes hungry

Where most she satisfies; for vilest things

Become themselves in her, that holy priests

Bless her when she is riggish.

Desdemona and the Bull

2007-12-10T09:17:00.000-08:00

And is it any wonder that I think

about the problem, that I think about

the pattern? Your denial is an ink

blot that has stained my soul and still you flout

your honesty before me like a cape

before a bull. Am I suppose to stand

and simply watch you, simply stand and gape

in stupefaction while the sword is fanned

in front of me? You over estimate

the bull's stupidity and pain, my dear,

when you rely upon your guesstimate

that I can do no harm. Before you steer

me to destruction, pause a moment. I

might swerve and follow you before I die.

— Piedmont Literary Review and In Raspberry Gulch

2007-11-16T08:42:00.001-08:00

8" x 10" oil on canvas

What is Spring

2007-11-16T08:30:00.000-08:00

4 1/2 x 7 3/4
Oil on canvas

What Is Spring?

after a short story by Janise Peoples

The afternoon was calm as Mama rocked

the porch swing. Jessie sat beside her. "What

is Spring?" he asked. "The teacher wants to know.

She said to write a poem, Mama, and

to tell her." Mama pointed to the yard

where zinnias were growing at the fence.

"It isn't only flowers. Spring is all

about the future. Most of all, it's life.

She took him to the road and pulled a leaf

of pig weed. "Amaranthus. We could have

the leaves for dinner. Later we could eat

the seeds. The Aztecs built a nation from

this weed along with corn and beans. She showed

how cranes bill stretched its neck and had him smell

the lupine. "Bees will spin the finest gold

from that." she said. "Your daddy, in the fall,

will harvest just a little bit for us

to dribble on our corn bread but he'll leave

the bees the rest to see them through the cold."

A dappled amber sunlight filled the yard.

"Just tell her, Jessie, you are Spring." She kissed

his head. "It's time for dinner. Come and help."

Trader Dan

2007-10-18T18:54:00.001-07:00

4" x 6" Linocut on Somerset paper
with Graphic Chemical vine-black ink.

His father took a day from selling cars

to take him to an antique car museum

in Cucamonga. Riding down the road,

the two of them together, all alone,

the boy remembered something he had heard

about a Cucamonga berry but

the fields they passed were only growing grapes.

He turned towards his father, "Do you know

where Cucamonga berries grow? I thought

I'd see them somewhere near." His father glanced

at him then pointed at a vineyard. "That's

the only berry growing here. It looks

to me like you've a little growing up

to do. You're either stupid or naive

to fall for Cucamonga berries, son,

and either one will get you nowhere fast.

You need the brains God gave you, to survive."

He rolled the window down and cleared his throat

and spat. "A Cucamonga berry! Don't

you ever hear what people say to you?

You have to listen to them, what they say

and what they mean, and know the difference from

a lie and when they're telling you the truth."

He spat again and rolled the window up.

Before the Hail Storm

2007-06-02T17:27:00.002-07:00

Zinc engraving on Somerset paper with Graphic Chemical bone black ink.

Blue vase with flowers and leaves

2007-03-27T10:43:00.000-07:00

Oil on canvas board

Global Warming

2007-03-27T10:41:00.000-07:00

Acrylic on canvas

Lorrie's stolen image

2007-03-27T10:26:00.000-07:00

Acrylic on canvas
after a photograph by Lori Nesbitt

With this picture I have become a great artist. At least I have become a great artist if you believe the statement, "A great artist steals. A poor artist only borrows." I stole a photograph of a friend after she posted it on her web page and used it as the subject of my painting. (If you really want to see the work of a great artist, you will have to see her work.)

In Raspberry Gulch

2006-04-17T16:43:00.000-07:00

3 1/2" x 5" hard ground and aquatint etching
on Somerset paper with black Daniel Smith ink.

Don't glue the pine cones to the trees
while the telephone watches with purple eyes
and the donut's an elephant,
glazed, trumpeting music like piccolos
playing themselves.
The moon melts
and flows over the ground like fog
and feeds on the street lights.

The griffins are hidden and waiting.
The moss covered griffins are waiting.

Don't

Ida Bell

2006-03-29T20:19:00.000-08:00

9" x 11" Charcoal drawing of Strathmore paper

The dead man sits on a pot-bellied stove
Ida-bell stays around, keeps the cobwebs off
the couple in the corner, pack-rats
steal a bullet shell leave a cactus thorn.
Take it to the hidie hole. Gold mine.
"Where's it at dead man?"
Shot him dead. Stretched on a tree.
Dead man's mine still.
Ida-bell
sings softly and she dances to the tune.
Dust motes, dead man, join her in the sun.
Her long blue dress sweeps the dust from the floor
where the dead man slept. "Bum! Get yourself a room."
Silver coin on the floor.
Dawn. Clouds in the sky burn. Sky blue.
Off to a lake where a pine cone falls
on the dead man's head
and a squirrel looks down
mad. Laugh, leave him to his home.
Soft night, sing while they ride.
Soft night, sing in the meadow in the night.
Laugh. Love.

Dust covered stranger stumbles
falls in a wagon rut.
Water drawing pebble dry,
sticking out a swollen tongue,
black lips crack blood dribbles down his chin.
Laugh.
Ida-bell looks down,
"Water in the bar." Leaves.
Tumbleweed?
Where?
Bar cool.
Die in the shade.

Ida-bell's bones used to rattle in a tree.
Dead man, dead drunk sleeps in the street
when the teamsters cursed.

I Think, Therefore Iamb

2006-03-25T13:03:00.000-08:00

Hard and soft ground etching with aquatint
on Rives BFK with black Daniel Smith ink.

I hate to write iambic garbage. It's
a pain! With trepidation I begin
this noisome task. I cringe beneath the din
of "bozo" I hear shouted from the pits
of my despair. I say that I don't care
if I succeed. It isn't fair that I
should have to waste my time on this. I try
again. The meter falls apart. It's unfair!
It's hopeless. Where's the garbage truck to take
this trash and clutter far away from me
and open up this loathsome cave to light?
Through reeking mental fumes I just can make
out images of freedom as I find
the end of this disgusting, ceaseless fight.

Exploring the Tide Pools

2006-03-25T12:47:00.000-08:00

Hard ground etching on Rives BFK

Her hair was tangled with the setting sun
as carefully, she knelt and watched the sea
anemone. The black sand glittering
the tide pool's edge was pulverized remains
of pyroclastic screams. The ocean's surge
did not disturb the sheltered remnants of
renewal. "Look," she said, and stroked the green
and purple fringe and watched it close, "I think
I know exactly how you feel. But don't
you see? You have responsibilities.
You can't just throw away the things you fought. . .
the things we both have fought and struggled for.
It isn't right for you to even ask."
The amber afternoon was breaking up.
The yellow, orange and purple sky and sea
dissolved together into gray and black.
"I think it's time that we were going home."

Sardinian Summer

2006-03-02T18:54:00.000-08:00

3 1/2" x 5" hard ground etching on
Arches cover with black Daniel Smith ink.

Wheat fields bend in a Mediterranean Summer.
Olive back burnt black
bends
under the weight of a scythe.
I do not know who I am-
a lizard on a fence post licking its tongue,
waiting for a caterpillar
to weave a chrysalis around its heart,
waiting for its heart to break open,
to split apart and spit out
what?
My head is hollow,
an empty seed pod waiting
for the quiet of a fog bank
to cool the Mediterranean sun,
waiting for the rattle parting the grasses
to pass;
waiting for the smell of moisture
on the yellow stalks of wheat.

The sere, burnt afternoon
has almost wiped away the memory
of morning.
The red sun puddles in the still air.
It is time to move. It is time to move.

It is time
to move

During the Perseids

2006-02-24T15:16:00.000-08:00

3 1/2" x 5" hard ground etching
on Arches Cover with Daniel Smith black etching ink

A water ouzel dips beneath the stars
Its empty belly drives its heart and mind.
A water strider, mayfly nymph or grub
contains the world; is life, philosophy,
religion, wealth. The native roses grow
along the edges of the stream and bloom
and aren't disturbed. The moon is shattered and
the fragments glitter in the silent night.

Du Fu Revisited

2006-02-24T15:04:00.000-08:00

3 1/2" x 5" hard and soft ground etching
on Arches Cover with black, Daniel Smith ink

Along the shore line
fine grasses sway.
The ship's mast towers
into the solitary night.
Stars
settle over
the wild, flat lands
the ship once passed.
The moon may leap
over this great, black, flowing river
but the ship will never sail again.
How do I make another start?
I am to old
to quit
these offices I've held.
Floating
on a river of forgetfulness:
one seagull and the moon.

At a Terrace Table

2006-02-18T20:59:00.000-08:00

3 1/2" x 5" drypoint etching
on Arches Cover with Daniel Smith black ink

At a Terrace Table

The candle flame, fractured in the cut-glass urn,
was slowly drowning in the molten wax.
Her fingers twirled a strand of auburn hair
that had spun a spider's web of softness
at her neck. "I just don't know what you want.
I don't know how you want me to reply."
She looked at him a little longer. "You
have made it very difficult for me."
She paused a moment, staring at the flame;
and through reflections in the window pane
she saw the rusted iron lily by
the pond and saw her blackened hands gesture.
"You just don't know how hard it is for me.
I wish you'd understand." The goldfish gasped
for air and swam in aimless circles in
the algae covered pond. Transparent hands
began to smooth the linen table cloth.

Figs

2006-02-04T16:22:00.000-08:00

Drypoint on Rives BFK with black Daniel Smith ink

Infinity

2006-02-04T15:41:00.000-08:00

Drypoint on Rives BFK with Daniel Smith black ink

Infinity

flying one sided figure
eights with gatling guns
blazing asynchronous,
blasting away their propellers;
they spin uncontrollably
down and around.
Frowning
Mobius flyboys,
volatiles,
clarify violence.
Indexed with chaos,
heretical . . . (burning)
beginning again
they are

Dracula's Benign Companion

2006-01-22T19:40:00.000-08:00

4" x 6" linocut on card stock with
black, water soluble, Speedball ink.

Poetry Becomes Philosophy

Ezra Pound has triumphed after all. That
crazy old man and his syncopating fans
succeeded when the rhetoric of guns
and communism failed. The Shining Path
has not been taken. The revolution
succeeded after all. Rabbi Ezra
has led the chosen through the wilderness
and gained the promised land for everyone.
The proletariat has risen in
their might; confronting Dimsdales with their "P's."
Their flood has fertilized the literature
and now the modern poet, Everyman;
eschews confining meter, scansion, rime.
That hoary frost has melted and it's Spring!
The fleurs du mal are blooming. It is time
to discard faded glories. Hail the king!

She Looks Beautiful and Aloof, But I Keep Looking for Goose-bumps on Her Belly

2006-01-18T13:05:00.000-08:00

9" x 12" charcoal sketch

Her belly button peeks through her long blond hair.
Posideon's son Polyphemeous looked the same
when he bashed out the brains of Odysseus's men.

Upward Facing Dog

2006-01-18T10:39:00.000-08:00

4" x 6" linocut printed on card stock with Speedball water-based ink.

My wife recently began taking yoga classes, and one of the first positions she learned was the upward facing dog. In the background of this picture are dogwood blossoms and leaves.

2006-01-16T21:52:00.000-08:00

The Saber-toothed Rose

I get dozens of gardening catalogues in the mail, and every one of them is full of beautiful roses guaranteed to grow in the most inhospitable environment. It seems like there are hundreds of roses developed each year, and each year the new roses are touted as being better, more gorgeous, more heavenly scented, and more trouble free than any rose has ever been. Multifarious rose societies have spent uncountable man-hours developing the perfect rose. Tens of millions of dollars have been spent by commercial nurseries such as Armstrong Nursery, Jackson and Perkins, The Monrovia Nursery, and Harry and David. And still, no one has come close to developing a rose that is deer proof and gopher proof.

As a result, instead of the beautiful roses that are displayed in the catalogues, what I get are the decimated leftovers from the midnight feasts of marauding deer and the underground attacks of the pocket gophers. It is time to develop a rose that will fight back. Instead of being attacked by gophers and deer, what is needed is a rose bush that will stand up for itself and attack the attackers. What is needed is a rose with attitude, a rose capable of defending itself. We need a housebroken, saber-toothed rose to arise like a phoenix from the dead, broken remains of the coddled, romanticized beauties sold in the catalogues.

This 4" x 6" solarplate etching began life as a charcoal drawing. It was printed on Lenox paper with black, Daniel Smith ink.

The Promise of Spring

2006-01-16T12:35:00.000-08:00

5" x 7"
Linocut printed with black, water-soluble, Speedball ink.

Spring is a time of waiting. It is not only a time when a young man's fancy turns to thoughts of love, or a time of re birth and regeneration. It is a time of uncertainty and despair. In e.e. cummings' poem, "in Just spring," it is a time where childhood and sexual maturity meet in that murky time where innocence will be transformed by a balloonman who becomes a goat-footed Pan enticing the children from their games of marbles and hopscotch. For T.S. Eliot, this the cruelest time of the year because it breeds hope in a land devoid of hope.

And yet spring has always brought with it a sense of renewal, a belief the hardships caused by winter can be forgotten, and a hope that the promise of a better life ahead will be fulfilled.

In this image, Spring has arrived, but the promise of Spring has not yet been fulfilled. There is a riot of grasses and flowers in the foreground, but the tree is still bare, and the sky is empty of life.

On the Mendecino Coast

A tangled wildness was choking out
the Iceland poppies she had set in rows
along the peeling, yellow picket fence.
She sat beneath the tree and thought about
the years she'd fought those weeds and all the hoes
she'd bought. Whatever for? If she'd the sense
of weeds and worms, she would have left them all
alone and saved herself the work. With him,
she could have sat beneath that weeping oak
and watched those wild weeds grow strong and tall
each spring and ripen in the summer. Tim
could laugh away the world. It was a joke
to him and he could laugh at everything
the world contained. He'd laugh at her out there
with dirty hands and knees and she would yell,
"You're good for nothing. That you are." and fling
a clod of dirt at him. He didn't care
if he was hit, but if he was he'd tell
her, "For a little gal, you've quite an arm."
and they would banter back and forth and then
he'd smile and call her something special and
it wouldn't matter what he did. What harm
was there in all his life? It's just, some men,
aren't meant to be a rock. Some men are sand.

The Naked Maja

2006-01-16T11:11:00.000-08:00

9" x 12" charcoal sketch

The alcove hidden underneath the stair
was now her home. She'd placed a narrow bed
against the kitchen wall and she would sleep
surrounded by her mirrors. Daddy took

the picture. They were staying at the beach

the day she would have graduated. She's
reclining on a beach towel with her right
hand shading out the sun. "You've got the air
of Madame Fauntleroy," her father said,
"and carry on with every no good creep.
You got to settle down; become a cook,
or something steady, sure." She held a peach
between her teeth and grinned at him. The trees
behind her held their future. "We just might
be in the clear this year. If we take care
of them, they'll care for us. Just tilt your head
a little to the side. You are too deep
in shadow. Catch the sun." It seemed a hook
would always jerk the future from her reach
when it was in her grasp. A late Spring freeze
destroyed the crop. She quickly stole a bite
of cheesecake and she giggled. Would he dare
to tell her once again she moved her head?
She'd laughed and threatened, "Take a flying leap!
I'll eat or you can paint another. Look,
you know the meaning of the phrase, 'To each
his own?'" She laughed at him. The Summer breeze
was soft on naked skin, and in that light
she felt resplendent. Pinning up her hair
for bed, she listened while her husband fed
himself and climbed the stairs. She pushed a heap
of unwashed clothes, her curling iron and book
on to the floor. Too bad you couldn't teach
me Daddy. Guess I just can't seem to please
anyone. Good night my dear, good night.