So Pleased

I am such a fortunate woman.  My watercolor paintings have been featured in a lovely blog that is “dedicated to artists and the people, places, and things that spark their creativity”. I started my painting to help clarify/illuminate all the thoughts that were spinning out of my fingers and into my blogs.  How cool is it that someone thought that they are good enough to be featured in an ‘artists’ blog’…I am such a fortunate woman!

So, if you’re interested in what Mr Timothy Pike had to say, here’s the blog entry…

http://timothypikemusic.wordpress.com/2014/04/14/mrs-bushrangers-incredible-watercolors/

…thank you Timothy…

Short Sighted

Once I was a plaything for kings and lords

Then I dined on hare and badger
But not today
Today the feast is bilbies and numbats

For mankind never imagined
When they ferried me across the seas

That I could quietly nestle
Sweetly positioned
To multiply, proliferate

Burrowing into the shallow soil
To find such easy prey
And destroy an ecosystem

So short-sighted…

Foxes were introduced into the Australian ecosystem in the 1800s — the idea was that the new Australian aristocracy wanted to ‘enjoy’ the British tradition of fox-hunting. They also introduced rabbits into the country — after all, those foxes would need something to eat, wouldn’t they?!?. Unfortunately, the foxes discovered that the Australian native critters were much more appealing than the introduced rabbits. Not surprising, the results are in — the foxes have wreaked havoc on the native wildlife. “At least 54 species of vertebrates have gone extinct in Australia since European settlement…Predation by the red fox has been proposed as an important mechanism which has contributed to these declines” * (and don’t get me started on what damage the rabbits have caused).

As a species, we do not have a very good track record when thinking through the implications of our actions. Maybe we’re just not as smart as we think…

*http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/resources/pestsweeds/RedfoxApproved.pdf
for additional information see:
http://informedfarmers.com/fox-problems-in-australia/
http://www.animalcontrol.com.au/foxes.htm

Frost’s Pride

It requires a steady hand
The pattern…intricate, precise
Each line must be perfect
Looking random, even haphazard
But the fine tracings, the angles exact
Needle sharp

There is no pattern
Yet the pattern is there

Blend in the perfect blush of azure
The glow of heaven
And my work here is done…

Hypnotic

The Master

I admit it, I can’t compete

To my amateurish stumbles

She is a virtuoso of composition

… a master of presentation

Her use of color

Of balance

Of contrast

Trump all that I could ever imagine

I gaze at her creations and am in awe

Thank you Mother Nature

It’s truly beautiful!

Captured Images

I admit to my compulsion
My addictive devotion
My urgency to find
And with a click to bind

The viewer to my view
All sumptuous color, tint and hue
As if by my sole, arrogant hand
Mankind’s blindness can remand

Forcing focus, draw the eye
Grab attention, never shy
To demand or to insist,
“See this image — grab this gift!”

Our world gives birth to wonders
That the shutter deftly captures
Crystallized, moments suspended
Immortalized, an instant un-ended

…the gift of photography

Incessant

Haunting in the background
Incessant, relentless, ruthless
Dragging or racing, with no middle ground
Nemesis, teacher, asset

What is the true value of time?
Its use defines its value
And you never get enough, so use it well
…tick, tick, tick…

Creatures

We live in a lavish world

Full of fascinating creatures

Each, a work of art

Each, contributing something unique

Something surprising

Something essential

Some small piece to the Substance of the Universe

Colors of Australia

The perfect setting
Of burnt gold and dusty olive
Up against an opal sky
With a cheerful greeting
And a flash of pink and silver
Sit two of the Sun-burnt Country’s brightest gems…
…the beautiful galahs…

The color palette of Australia is very different from anywhere else in this world.  The landscape colors are dusty,  almost aged looking. The trees are mostly from the eucalyptus family, with leaves that seem to be saturated with golds and olives.  Even the ground is a smoky, brick color.  But the birds…oh the birds are a glorious riot of  colors. Parrots abound; hundreds of them (maybe even thousands) congregate on the lawns and grasses acting like the pigeons of Venice, Italy or New York, USA…

…the Land Down Under is a unique and beautiful place.  It’s as if Mother Nature deliberately made the landscape in muted colors so the startling colors of the birds  could be fully appreciated.

http://www.birdsinbackyards.net/species/Eolophus-roseicapillus

Silverback

Dusk approaches

The silverback tells us it’s time

Time to collect soft leaves, gentle grasses

Time to nest, secure and protected

Time to comfort, to suckle, to nurse

Time to laugh, to grieve, to love

Under the watchful eye of our mate, our husband, our leader

The Silverback.

Gorillas are normally shy creatures, living mostly on leaves, roots and fruits.  They live in families/groups of six to twelve, with the oldest and largest, the ‘silverback’, leading all the daily activities. Gorillas have amazed scientists with their range of emotions; they have been known to laugh, to grieve, to have strong family ties, to think about the past and future…to have rich emotional lives.*

The gorillas are quickly disappearing. Poaching, loss of habitat and the Ebola virus are decimating the few remaining gorillas.  At last count, there were approximately 700 Mountain gorillas and less than 300 Cross Mountain gorillas remaining.**

Remember them as the shy, intelligent creatures that they are. They have been known to learn human sign language, they have individual color preferences, they make and use tools, and they share between 95% to 99% of mankind’s DNA. ***

So, I guess you could say we’re losing a distant member of our family…

* http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/09/12/tech/main3254141.shtml
**http://www.defenders.org/gorilla/basic-facts
*** http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gorilla

Love According to Kate

“Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get — only what you are expecting to give — which is everything…You give because you love and cannot help giving.”

…so said the woman who epitomized the ‘modern woman’ of the 20^th Century. Katherine Hepburn, one of the most recognizable actresses of her day, was “outspoken, assertive, athletic, and wore trousers before it was fashionable for women to do so”. She “refused to conform to societal expectations of women”, and yet she so loved a man that she was willing to change who she was, in order to please him. She was a study in contradictions. The above quote was in reference to her love for fellow actor, Spencer Tracy…but I think I will end with a different Katherine Hepburn quote:

“Sometimes I wonder if men and women really suit each other. Perhaps they should live next door and just visit now and then.”

 …hummm….maybe….

http://womenshistory.about.com/cs/quotes/a/qu_k_hepburn.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katherine_Hepburn