Flowers for Cindy...

In loving memory of

Celinda Louise Allyn Lockwood

3/30/1965-4/18/2010

Gone too soon my niece

We miss your strength and beauty

Angel, rest in peace.

©2010 Photographs property of Jan Boults Photography

Magpie Tales Photo Prompt No.10 "Celinda's Time"

"Celinda's Time"

Today I saw time

End the battle and allow

The eyes to show truth

Time for her to go

Refusing our denial

She is strong waiting

In time I will stand

At her grave, time will be still

Grieving the life lost.

Haiku Poem, ©2010 Janice Stiles-Boults

For my first niece in Stage 4 Cancer, nearing the end.

This week's photo prompt reminded me of

The Persistence of Time

by Salvador Dali

The Persistence of time is also sometimes known as The Persistence of Memory, Melting Clocks, Soft Watches and Droopy Watches. Officially however, it is known as La persistencia de la memoria.

Created in 1931 by Salvador Dali and owned by the Museum of Modern Art in New York since 1934, this seminal work of surrealistic art is certainly Dali’s and the Surrealist movements most recognisable icon. The painting represents Dali’s thoughts on softness and hardness, which was a theme of much of his work during that part of his life.

The imagery of The Persistence of Time is often read as an illustration of Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity, where gravity can be seen to distort time.

 

 

Watch photograph courtesy of Willow @ http://willowmanor.blogspot.com/

Willow, of "Life at Willow Manor", began Magpie Tales in February. Every week writers sign up and then post a poem or fictional story to go with a photograph prompt that Willow provides. Check out http://magpietales.blogspot.com/ to join in the fun!

Dali photo and information courtesy of Google Search and Images

Magpie Tales Photo Prompt No.9-"Cherries in the Snow"

Cherries in the Snow

I took one look at her and thought, oh no, that isn’t right, Jeesuus Chriiist, I’ll have to do it myself! The one time I didn’t do the hair and makeup, and on such an important occasion. I’d done the same old hair routine hundreds of times; wash, color rinse, roller set, dry – that stuffy old lady blue-haired tight curl, like the queen of England. And the lipstick was wrong too; she had used the same color since Revlon came out with it in 1942, Cherries in the Snow, or some such name.

I set to work, chatting to her the whole time. The blue outfit won’t work either, it makes you look too washed out; how about the peach pantsuit you wore to the fiftieth anniversary? Yes, that is much better, as I laid the jacket against her chest. Those finely tweezed arched eyebrows that were almost gone, needed the little pencil line she would draw in everyday. I then applied the dark lipstick over lips that refused to relax, and whispered it’s the best I can do Ma under the circumstances.

The hair was the problem - I wasn’t sure how I was going to get it dry. I didn’t have the big hooded dryer with me; the one she liked to sit under, having a cocktail, on our weekly ‘spa day’ visit. There was a blow dryer in the ladies room that did the job just fine. I told her all kinds of stories that day, as we prepared for the afternoon appointment. I was no cosmetician, but all in all, she looked much better when I was finished.

I held her hand, I did not cry. This was an ending and a beginning, of changes to come, new paths to journey forward upon. I said goodbye as the sound of Pachelbel’s Canon reached my ears, and drifted through the hushed quiet of the funeral home. Beautiful, gentle music by the harpist and organist we had hired to play her favorite songs would comfort us during the long hours of her wake.


©2010 Janice Stiles-Boults
Photograph courtesy of Willow
@ http://willowmanor.blogspot.com/
Willow, of "Life at Willow Manor", began Magpie Tales in February. Every week writers sign up and then post a poem or fictional story to go with a photograph prompt that Willow provides. Check out http://magpietales.blogspot.com/ to join in the fun!

Magpie Tales Photo Prompt No.7-"A Year of Mourning"

A Year of Mourning

My heartache is renewed by a fresh pierce of pain

How will we ever face Christmas without you?

The season holds precious memories

This time is the hardest of all.

We will miss you more

Than one could imagine

As we approach the final stage

Of our first year of mourning.

January saw our tree slowly dying

As it lay neglected on the porch

Something you were spared

Your death not comprehensible.

Spring brought me daffodils from bulbs

You gave me that very last fall,

When they appeared, I cried out loud

And lay down in all that golden glory.

Mother's day shattered my emotions

While pounding the ground for your garden

A gift that would help to heal my soul.

Summer was long and steamy

I spent a week wandering

Old halls, calling for your ghost.

Autumn brought splendid colors

Sprinkled throughout my yard

I found I could not cope, it was just too hard.

Winter came with a sudden burst

Brilliant snow white, shining clear

That made me hurt for that last day

Of your last year on Earth.

New Year's eve descended, suddenly we were there

The anniversary of your death

We did not hurt any less

At the end of this year of mourning.

There was no doubt in my mind when I saw the lovely daffodil photo that I would have to use this poem. Daffodil bulbs were one of the last gifts I received from my mother in the Fall of 1994, and of course when they came up in the spring, after her death, it was the most amazing gift from heaven. I cannot look at daffodils without this memory. So, thus the reason for not writing a new poem for this Magpie. Thanks!

©Janice Stiles-Boults, poem, "A Year of Mourning", page twenty-four from the book "A Year of Mourning", previously published©1996, 1999, 2005.

Magpie Tales Photo Prompt No.6-"Nails To Feathers"

Nails to Feathers

It was becoming rather tedious, but it was a good paying job, and I still had another year of grad school, so beggars can’t be choosers, right? My job was to lie on a bed of nails, which I did in a staged performance five days a week and weekends at the Museum of Science in Boston. I also did my “act” several times a month in the labs at M.I.T. for the students majoring in Physics. There were mistakes and injuries in the beginning; it took many hours of training and a calm patience. I didn’t have many friends, they couldn’t quite grasp what it was I did, and for the most part, they thought I was weird. Yes, it is an unusual practice, but one that has been a cultural tradition for meditation and relaxation in India for thousands of years.

One might think of the freak show at carnivals or the circus; that dark ominous tent, full of the strange and bizarre, but it wasn’t anything magical or mystical at all. Most of those acts were exaggerated to be shocking, but were totally phony. Changes in entertainment led to the decline of these human sideshows, and some states banned or outlawed them all together. The exhibition of human oddities, “freaks of nature”, can be traced back for centuries. Strong man, tallest, oldest, shortest; then there was the elephant man, spider boy, camel girl, the bearded lady of Geneva – and, the man who sleeps on a bed of nails! This act was to express bravery and lack of pain, when in fact, it was a simple physics demonstration on the principles of pressure.

Freak shows were popular in the United States between 1840 and the 1970s, and in many states one can still find them. In the 1630s, Lazarus Colloredo, and his parasitic twin brother, John Baptista, who was attached at Lazarus' sternum, toured Europe. The early 19th century brought Chang and Eng, "the original Siamese twins", to an exhibition in America. P.T. Barnum arrived in London with Tom Thumb, the famous midget. Coney Island was the sight of the World Circus Sideshow,” operating from 1922 to 1941 by “Professor” Samuel Wagner, known as “The Godfather” of the Coney Island Freak Show. These bizarre anomalies were eventually scientifically explained as genetic mutations or diseases, and so-called freaks were no longer feared, but given sympathy instead. Lying on a bed of nails, however, wasn’t all that freaky, it just took practice, and it was actually beneficial to the body.

In Russia, in the 1980’s, physicians found that the effects of the bed of nails showed great results for the immune system, metabolic rates and decrease in stress levels. Psychological changes also occurred; with aggression levels decreasing, alleviation of depression, and a sense of well-being developing.

The trick is getting on and off the bed; my technique was to roll onto the bed in one quick motion, once the body weight is evenly dispersed, there is no risk of injury. If you try to sit, or put a hand down, that area will receive the brunt of pressure and cause the nail to puncture your skin. In early training, three pieces of plywood are set on top of the nails; once I am stretched out, an assistant removes each board from under me, and I remain balanced on the nails. Other methods have beds with railings, so you can slowly lower yourself onto the nails. I have a few scars and puncture holes here and there, but I have it down to, well, a science, and rather enjoy the stimulation, my body very accustomed to it now. Overall, I rarely have emotional issues, being quite calm and balanced, and I don’t suffer from any health problems, so I would recommend the bed of nails as extremely therapeutic.

This job has helped me earn a living while in college, a “hit the nail on the head” kind of idea, because I will soon earn my doctorate in Physics after eight long years of studying. It has been hard as nails, I’ve bitten my nails, I could have spit nails at times, and of course, it's been a real bed of nails. When I go home each night to my single dorm on the top floor of an old brownstone, the one item dominating the room is a giant featherbed!

©2010, Janice Stiles-Boults
http://www.5min.com/Video/Physics-in-Action-A-Bed-of-Nails-174070816
Information courtesy of Google Searches & Wikipedia
Photograph courtesy of Willow
@ http://willowmanor.blogspot.com/
Willow, of "Life at Willow Manor", began Magpie Tales in February. Every week writers sign up and then post a poem or fictional story to go with a photograph prompt that Willow provides. Check out http://magpietales.blogspot.com/ to join in the fun!

WELCOME SPRING!

Fruitlands' fine art collection contains over 100 Hudson River School landscape paintings, more than 230 19th century vernacular portraits, textiles, and works on paper. The collection also contains silhouettes, mourning pictures, documents, framed textiles, and glass plate negatives.

The Hudson River School is generally thought to be the first identifiably American school of art. During the early 19th century artists like Penneman, Durand, Cole, and Fisher began painting natural scenes of America. Artists like Bierstadt and Church among others held fantastically popular art shows in New Your. Many of these early works featured areas in upper New York State, partly as advertising for the emerging tourist industry which attracted people from the city up the Hudson River.

Early 19th century vernacular portraits illustrate rural New Englanders and the bonds that had held rural communities together. We can find signs of the times in the portraits that were produced in rural New England between 1800 and 1850. The primitive portrait painters frequently included details that help us understand what their patrons valued and how their world was changing.
http://www.fruitlands.org/gallery

Spring Equinox, 1:32 pm edt

March 20, 2010!

Magpie Tales Photo Prompt No. 5 - "Matched Pair"

The task at hand was given,
Handle it with care;
Palm the difference tomorrow
Drop the cross you bear.
Wooden nails claw the surface
Screws resist the scratch;
Pointed and stern, you are fingered,
As the one holding the match.

©Janice Stiles-Boults

Photograph courtesy of Willow

@ http://willowmanor.blogspot.com/

Willow, of "Life at Willow Manor", began Magpie Tales in February. Every week writers sign up and then post a poem or fictional story to go with a photograph prompt that Willow provides. Check out http://magpietales.blogspot.com/ to join in the fun!