How Many

abstract pastel sketch
abstract pastel sketch
Opression

It wasn’t just the four officers it took to arrest a non-resisting African American man and three of them to lie him down on the concrete and all kneel on him and handcuff him, it wasn’t just the 8 minutes and 46 seconds Derek Chauvin knelt on George Floyd’s neck on the pavement in the heat with crowds around openly taking videos of the scene and pointing out to him that the man needed help and was dying, it wasn’t just that he told other officers who showed concern that this was how Floyd should be handled, it wasn’t just his lack of reaction to Floyd’s audible pleas for help, it was the expression on Chauvin’s face through it all that tells the underlying story.

Chauvin looks relaxed and unafraid of either the man beneath his knee or all the bystanders who are watching and openly videotaping. George Floyd was at that point unable to resist even if he’d wanted to, and Chauvin knew that no matter what happened, even with all those witnesses, he wasn’t going to get into any trouble, and he frankly looks annoyed. In any case, he’s not worried about going home that night and there would be no repercussions against him for what he was doing. That makes it pretty clear that this had happened before and that the system supported the white police officer, and not the African American citizen, based on prior experience.

Don’t forget that expression on Chauvin’s face. As we watch the ensuing protests and even riots following this public murder, remember that’s the expression African Americans have been facing from white people since they were brought here in chains 400 years ago. Centuries of time and a bloody civil war 150 years ago have made no difference. In my life of nearly 60 years, the African Americans of my generation and the generations following have been able to make no progress in living as equal citizens of this country.

Even I see that expression on white faces when I try to point out all the ways African Americans are openly excluded from everyday life in this country whether their heritage derives from emancipated slaves after the Civil War or their ancestors or they themselves emigrated from other countries around the world with predominantly black populations. We’ve never cleaned the contamination of racism from our country, and in fact a population of citizens have worked hard to keep it in place by way of redlining neighborhoods, gerrymandering voting populations and placement of polling places and outlining school districts, and employers who can always find a reason not to hire an African American person. Lately they’ve even been demonstrating publicly for the right to do these things.

That’s what makes the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis more than just his murder, and why riots have broken out all over the country. That’s what shows it’s a symptom of something much bigger, the bump on the skin that connects to the cancer filling the body, the cancer of police killing African American men and otherwise arresting African American citizens in general, at a much higher rate than whites as they are represented in the population, and continued social segregation though that very segregation is illegal. [1] [2] [3]

In February a white man and his son packed their shotguns into their pickup and ran to chase the escaped slave who left his own plantation to go running through white society in Brunswick, GA, and they caught up with him and shot and killed him. That’s just what the death of Ahmaud Arbery sounded like to me from the first I’d heard of it, even before the video, even before I saw the photos of Gregory and Travis McMichael. The incident itself was painful enough to watch, and consider how easy it would be to turn the story against Arbery who couldn’t defend himself, especially hearing the reason for chasing him—he’d been seen going into a house under construction and poking around, and the McMichaels claimed there had been thefts in the neighborhood. Easy as pie, that one, proved correct when the news was released that the Brunswick District Attorney had looked at the case and said there was nothing to see there and no one should be arrested, and even as he recused himself from the case a month later for personal connections he again advised that there should be no arrests. Seventy-four days after Arbery’s death the McMichaels were finally arrested and the case investigation has escalated to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. That was three weeks ago. People are still understandably angry about how it was handled. [4]

In Louisville, KY undercover agents stormed into the apartment of Breonna Taylor because their suspect in a narcotics investigation occasionally received mail at her apartment. Her boyfriend awoke and shot at the strangers who’d broken in, and the officers returned fire with eight bullets into Breonna, killing her. There is back and forth now about whether or not they announced themselves before they broke the door down, but in reality the suspect had already been arrested. [5]

And at least birdwatcher Christian Cooper didn’t die when a white woman called police on him when he asked her to put her dog on a leash, as rules in the section of Central Park, known for birding, require. Amy Cooper (no relation) actually threatened him with the phone call saying she would call the police and tell them an African American man was threatening her life. He videotaped her as she did so. Both were gone by the time police arrived but Christian Cooper’s posting of the video went viral and Amy Cooper was ultimately fired from her job and gave the dog in question back to the rescue. But how often in the past has a woman saying an African American man was acting inappropriately toward her caused his death? [6]

Those examples are just three other cases that made the news in the past three months, ones that are being remembered in demonstrations in those cities, and other cases that actually made the news locally or nationally around the country over the past few years. And just the act of existing while black, with police called by white people who find African Americans suspicious as they do just about any everyday thing, while jokes can always be made, is a constant flow of threats during everyday life.

And unless it’s investigated, the case is forgotten, and the incident, the person killed and their memory are buried together, but not by those left behind who know there was no justice and have little hope there will be in the future. That constant trauma of violent loss and the fear that you could be next would fill anyone with rage and reaction when they see it happen again, and again, and again. The protesters out there have repeatedly said they don’t condone vandalism and destruction, and neither do I, but bearing the pain and trauma of all the deaths, all the injustice, all the restraints society puts on African Americans, why not burn it all down and start over? Why preserve what’s there, metaphorically at least, when in African American neighborhoods—and why are there still African American neighborhoods?—it’s still separate and unequal, and after centuries and lots of hard work by African Americans and white people alike there is no hope that will ever change?

I don’t judge my safety on the race of the person before me. If I saw Ahmaud Arbery running down the street we’d probably nod and smile at each other as we passed. If I saw the McMichaels in their pickup with their guns, I’d get my mace in my hand and look for the nearest safe place to run if I needed to.

And I have a lot of freedom, freedom that we all deserve, because of my race. When I’m out trapping feral cats and poking around in an alley and looking into back yards at night with a flashlight, when the police are called they always accept my explanation that I’m trapping cats, and there are no threats, no arrest just to check on me, no harassment. And when I decide to walk down the middle of a street looking up at the sky to watch the hawk, or walk along the trail through the woods singing at the top of my voice, or act otherwise erratic—or, as they say it when you’re white, eccentric—no one calls the police on me. I have this freedom that everyone should have, to be whoever we are and be given the benefit of the doubt when we explain what we’re doing.

I can’t breathe officer
don’t kill me

they gon’ kill me man

come on man

I cannot breathe

I cannot breathe

they gon’ kill me

they gon kill me

I can’t breathe

I can’t breathe

please sir

please

please

please I can’t breathe

George Floyd’s last words transcribed from the video [7]

I’ve tried to look back in history and find the point where it went wrong, to go back there and start again. But there is no point where African Americans ever had equality in this country, no matter what laws had been passed, and no time when death at the hands of authorities wasn’t common. Let’s just try to burn down the social structure that keeps people oppressed, let’s really just incinerate it and toss the ashes out into space so there’s nothing left.

And it’s not enough for each of us to “not be racist” or “not discriminate”. We have to call out those who do, and have a strong argument on hand to prove it. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. frequently mentioned the importance of speaking out for justice, and the injustice of staying silent, and the importance of nonviolence.

The ultimate tragedy of Birmingham was not the brutality of the bad people, but the silence of the good people.~The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr. Ed. Clayborne Carson, 2001, Chapter 18 [8]

I have also decided to stick with love, for I know that love is ultimately the only answer to mankind’s problems.~Sermon: “Where Do We Go From Here?” [9]

I have felt a fundamental change coming for some time, years, months, days. For better or worse, I think it’s here.

References

[1] https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/un-report-on-racial-disparities/

[2] https://www.naacp.org/criminal-justice-fact-sheet/

[3] https://www.huffpost.com/entry/police-killings-lynchings-capital-punishment_b_8462778

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Ahmaud_Arbery

[5] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/breonna-taylor-kenneth-walker-911-call-police-shooting/

[6] https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/27/us/amy-cooper-central-park-call-police-trnd/index.html

[7] https://secure.avaaz.org/campaign/en/george_floyd_loc/?slideshow

[8] https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/chapter-18-birmingham-campaign

[9] https://www.beaconbroadside.com/broadside/2017/08/martin-luther-king-jrs-where-do-we-go-from-here-sermon-50-years-later.html


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Grateful

blue-eyed mary
blue-eyed mary
A clearing in the woods filled with blue-eyed mary.

I’ve passed this spot on a back road each spring for years. Looking down into a valley coursed by a winding stream I see what looks like a bluish haze just above the ground among the trees and in an open clearing, on both sides of the stream and reaching up the sides of the little valley, extending at least the length of a football field. I know the haze is a population of wildflowers. Wildflowers always call me to come and meet them, see their little faces and study their leaves, learn about their habits and habitats. No visit is complete without a full course of photos from every angle to document them, and to share the beauty that called me to that place.

blue-eyed mary
Seen from the road.

Even though I take this road intentionally to look at all the things I’ve found interesting and photographed from afar, each year I’ve found a reason not to stop and explore this little valley on foot, to see the details in that blue haze and interpret them to share in my own way.

Usually I’m on my way somewhere else and because I’m always late the reason is a lack of time. This can’t be explored in just a few minutes and a photo or two. This needs a walk down a hill and across a stream, and all around where the flowers grow, even walking partway up the other side of the valley. And once I start, I don’t know when to stop. I can’t be trusted to be aware of time.

One day last year I did have the time and my DSLR camera, but it was just before the diagnosis of my need for a hip replacement and stepping out of my car at the top of that slope I knew there was no way I could walk down without falling, or crawling. Crawling on gravel and bits of coal is not without its nicks and scrapes. I’ve done it. So I looked, and moved on.

blue-eyed mary
What I saw from the road.

This year I took the time. I’d run to the trail as the mist rose on a spring morning just to photograph what was there, and was on my way back home. I intentionally turned up that road taking a different way home than the usual, scanning the little valley for whatever it had to offer. I saw smaller colonies of these flowers, but remembered much more in other areas, then, finally, there it was. And conveniently a place to safely pull over and park on this two-lane back road and a sort of road down and into the area from off-road vehicles. I had no excuse.

blue-eyed mary
Perhaps the fog is still here.

LIttle wildflower-filled valleys like these are like timeless wonderlands. Scrappy slender trees mix with mature trees, fallen trunks tangle with wild grapevines and Virginia creeper vine, and the performance is set for wave after wave of blooming spectacles here and there in its own unique floodplain culture.

blue-eyed mary
Along the stream.

I waded the stream and came to my closeup of the flowers that at first looked like violas, but I identified as blue-eyed mary, four petals, two top in white and two bottom in blue, occasionally violet or deep pink.

blue-eyed mary
Closeup.

The sky was still overcast from the fog, but as I walked along the road and among the flowers, deciding on good vantage points and snapping photos here and there, the sun broke through the clouds and bands of bright and shadow moved over the little valley, illuminating the young leaves.

blue-eyed mary
Like mist among the trees.

But how to capture the full effect of the display? If I had had a bit of a ladder or a rock or stump to stand on I may have been able to capture it better, but the photo at the top captures the extent of it best. And the photo below captures the density.

blue-eyed mary
A field full.

Grateful

I am grateful for my new hip, remembering last year, considering the prospect of never being able to explore a wildflower field again, and having the time to take this year.

I am grateful for my new old car, without which I hadn’t been able to go anywhere earlier this year.

I am grateful for the equipment to capture this place in a way that I uniquely visualize.

I am grateful that there are such things in this world as this precious little valley and all its beauty.

I am grateful that I can share this, and that others see the beauty in it too.

I am grateful to all those who helped me arrive at this place over the past two years and more.

I have many, many other things to be grateful for, but as I walked my steps around this place, these were my thoughts.


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Healing, Now and For the Future

Periwinkle Party

Today is the six-month anniversary of my hip replacement surgery. I have long been back on my feet, but still working my in-home physical therapy for strengthening and flexibility all over, which is not a bad thing for someone my age and work needs: sitting or standing for hours on end. I am grateful for this surgery. I really didn’t think I’d regain all my personal ability and strength after the surgery, I’ve always been active and flexible, still climbing trees and tying myself into knots to get a good position to photograph one of my cats from an interesting angle. But I have, and it’s like a new life after two years of debility, a great thing to be celebrating here at the beginning of spring.

The world has changed dramatically in these past six months. The day I went into surgery, October 3, 2019, the temperature was 85 degrees and overnight was a record 65 degrees, and I had barely slept for the heat and worrying about the unknowns of my surgery and recovery, and wishing this crazy weather would just stop already. As I recovered ability more quickly than I thought, I looked forward to just about this point in time because, while full healing really takes a year or more, by this point I’d be able to clean up my garden (in the photo) and start planting, ride my bike to the grocery store, clear away the housekeeping mess from two years of inability to move and carry things, even vacuum the floor, pack up my car and go to some of my first vendor events and start replacing my income once again.

I will do many of those things, but I think with where we are today, facing the unknown of what this pandemic will do to the things we’ve always done and the ways we’ve always done them, I have changed my goals from returning to the way things were for me to working with the way things are, and getting ready for the changes to come. I still have sustaining income to replace. I need a car and a furnace, and a long list of things that I need to do to my house, but realistic expectations are what work best in uncertainty. It’s like the state of my garden right now—the structure is there underneath the two-year overgrowth of neglect, and I’ll be able to clear things away and get a garden started again, but I’ll likely never have the mature, productive vegetable haven I had. Instead, I’ll have what I need for today, and next year, which will be different from my beloved garden developed over decades; it will be more of what I need, less of what I want, and in reality that’s what made my older garden so successful.

I know the best way to navigate uncertainty. I got to and through my surgery and recovery with the help of a safety net and many friends generous with time and skills, and I’ve started my economic recovery with the generosity of many others who shared my story and have purchased art and merchandise to help replace income I clearly won’t get without vendor events. I know the power of helping each other, and the best way to get through this time of uncertainty and change is—virtually at the moment—hand in hand, supporting each other in both individual and common needs. We all have needs, and we can all help another with their needs at the same time. We fit together like puzzle pieces, and imagine the complexity of an 8 billion-piece puzzle that is all of us on this blue globe, floating through space.

I’m back on the earth and looking forward to tackling that garden over this coming weekend of beautiful sun and spring weather. I hope you have great plans too!

February 2020 Personal Creative Challenge, Day 27: Winter Bouquet

dried wildflowers with snow
dried wildflowers with snow
Winter Bouquet

My daily photo today unexpectedly inspired some verse. It just began writing itself in my head so I thought I’d bring it here and work on it.

When I share my daily photos I typically write something about it, often just a mundane note of what or where it is, an identification of a wildflower or butterfly, or sometimes just a thought; sometimes an extended thought that becomes an essay or a poem. I go where it leads me.

Here is the original version:

In late summer, in the fullness of plenty,
I filled my arms with your brilliant yellow and warm green,
followed by bees besotted with your gentle scent,
burying my face into your softness, thinking of beds made of your flowers;
today in the cold, punishing wind, the swirling snow,
all decorations weathered away,
I could see your naked strength holding your essence outright,
catching snowflakes,
with faith in spring.

I had intended to talk about the spareness and simplicity of the scene, a pure little moment, but my mind went to the flowers and identified them as goldenrod and one of our native wild sunflowers, likely jerusalem artichokes. That made me remember what those plants look like in late summer when they begin to bloom most heavily, how I love to see them, their volume of stems and leaves and flowers, their light fragrance and the hum of hungry bees, and the contrast with what is left behind, the essentials, swaying in winter wind, catching snowflakes, holding onto those seeds of the future until spring.

I knew the words weren’t quite what I wanted, but getting the thought down was important. I had to move on with my day and wanted to let it sit for a while, then come back to it. So here I am. And here is an edit, though there may be more.

In the heat of late summer,
in the fullness of plenty,
I filled my arms with your brilliant yellow and tender green
amid the hum of bees besotted with your gentle scent,
buried my face in your softness, thinking of beds made of your flowers;
today in the cold, punishing wind, the swirling snow,
all ornament weathered away,
I could see your naked strength as you held your essence in your outstretched hands,
catching snowflakes,
with faith in spring.

It became a sort of love poem too, with an intimacy in the imagery. But isn’t that what nature is all about?

I think that’s good for now..

I began this year with a pledge to myself and my art: To be certain I won’t let ideas pass me by I’m setting myself up for a personal painting challenge in February, similar to the painting challenges I’ve participated in in past years. I aspire (but don’t expect) to create a painting or sketch every day in the month, to be posted on my blog each day.

This is my work from Day 27. See other creative efforts in this and other creative challenges on the page Creative Challenges on www.PortraitsOfAnimals.net.


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Friendship Friday.

The Blush That Rise

Softish glow

The blush that rise at end of a winter’s day
to meet the early falling darkness,
shine like roses of June
among tracings of trees,
light our hearth fire,
cast each other
in warm tones
of familiar
devotion.

poem © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Draft composed for this week’s prompt “blush”.

I began this year with a pledge to myself and my art: To be certain I won’t let ideas pass me by I’m setting myself up for a personal painting challenge in February, similar to the painting challenges I’ve participated in in past years. I aspire (but don’t expect) to create a painting or sketch every day in the month, to be posted on my blog each day.

This is my work from Day 17. See other creative efforts in this and other creative challenges on the page Creative Challenges on www.PortraitsOfAnimals.net


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One Chance to Be

crocus buds
crocus buds
One Chance to Be

Cycle turning biology undeniable
tender green pushes through
soil hard and frozen,
offers budding violet hope
as bitter storm roars in,
opens to adversity
hesitate, hide, wait, unthought
for only one chance to…be.

I’ve been working out this concept since the gray morning I saw the first flower color of this year—violet crocus buds. I ran out to photograph them and posted that on Instagram with a brief comment, but continued to think about it. Though the weather has been warm, an arctic cold front was headed our way with snow, winds and several days and nights of severe cold. Here was my original thought:

“Not concerned about incoming storm. Can’t wait to see them bloom!”

This happens each spring. The crocuses sprout and bud, later the crocuses do the same, and even later the tulips, and cold fronts come and go, frosty mornings, inches of snow, and yet they bloom and freeze and flowers open again, as if nothing had happened to them.

It’s not like they have much choice. They are literally rooted in place. They are on a biological schedule and really can’t choose to put things off, or tuck themselves back under the soil because freezing weather is on the way. They just do what they do, and somehow they survive despite brutal setbacks. Here they were, tiny delicate yet colorful little things, facing down a winter storm that humans were out racing around for toilet paper and milk in order to survive.

I knew a poem was in order even before the Instagram post. A couple of days later I shared the photo on my photo blog with the original draft of my thoughts.

Unconcerned about incoming storm,
hiding impossible,
crocus buds stand tall,
open leaves to adversity,
brighten world with color,
ready for one chance to…be.

And I liked that, but by writing it I discovered that my core point of inspiration with the crocus buds was that while the crocus might perish in the prolonged subfreezing temperatures, it was on a biological schedule of development and maturity with one purpose: to flower and produce the next generation. Hiding itself, protecting itself it would surely die, without light to continue developing it would stop, then start an irreversible decay. Going forward and dealing with what it was given was the best chance for it to . . . be.

Of course, these are my human thoughts, how brave the little crocus be to stand upright and present tender buds to the storm, we should all be that valiant. It doesn’t have a choice, we do, we could bundle up and stay inside in a real winter storm, as we metaphorically could when adversity comes our way, but we could also deal with it. We can take many chances at a goal, the crocus only has one chance, and is usually successful. So I tried to create that with different words.

Here is the poem again:

Cycle turning biology undeniable
tender green pushes through
soil hard and frozen,
offers budding violet hope
as bitter storm roars in,
opens to adversity
hesitate, hide, wait, unthought
for only one chance to…be.

Sometimes it’s interesting to see how it develops.

I began this year with a pledge to myself and my art: To be certain I won’t let ideas pass me by I’m setting myself up for a personal painting challenge in February, similar to the painting challenges I’ve participated in in past years. I aspire (but don’t expect) to create a painting or sketch every day in the month, to be posted on my blog each day.

This is my work from Day 15. See other creative efforts in this and other creative challenges on the page Creative Challenges on www.PortraitsOfAnimals.net


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A Walk in Black and White Film

I loaded a roll of black and white film into my old Pentax K1000 and headed out to walk to the grocery store, bringing back images from around my neighborhood along with my groceries.

Though this is a photo essay I also describe the process and reason for taking my camera on mundane walks to find extraordinary things, including story and poetry ideas. In fact, there will be at least one story out of this walk, and it’s in there among the photos. I can’t wait to see where it starts and where it goes!

One of the reasons for using black and white film is that removing the distraction of color permits other interesting elements to shine and become the story, and using film slows me down, makes me think a little harder about using one more frame on this roll. When I’m out with my digital DSLR I just let go and photograph anything I darned well please, and I need to do that too, let go and just be part of the scene and record it as I feel it.

But sometimes, just as with writing, to get to the core of something, you need to slow down, tighten up and focus, search yourself and funnel down to exactly what it is you want to say. Going “old school” with black and white film in the old (but still beloved) Pentax K1000 is like writing your stuff on a tablet with your favorite writing implement: pencil, ballpoint pen, marker, fountain pen. I love my gel pen on a legal pad, but when a poem comes along any scrap of writable material and any writing implement will do for a draft.

So enjoy the photos and the essay on my photography blog, Today: A Walk in Black and White Film


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I Don’t Want to Be Colorblind

january20-2014-1000px-2
january20-2014-1000px-2
I Don’t Want to Be Colorblind

I Don’t Want To Be Colorblind

I don’t want to be
colorblind,
I want to paint
what I see,
the colors of our faces
like flowers,
not different
but tones of each others’
faces
as we turn toward the light,
we blend so beautifully.

poem and artwork © 2014 Bernadette E. Kazmarski

The illustration above is a sampler of all the shades of pastel I’ve used while painting portraits and sketches of people of all different “colors”, skin tones and ethnicities. Tell me, who is “black” and who is “white”? And what does “colored” mean?

In truth, we are all “colored”. Each of our faces has the darkest and lightest tones and all those in between, and even some colors we’d be surprised to find in skin tones. I can tell you that all the colors I smudged there have appeared in the highlights and shadows and mid-tones of every face. It largely depends on where you are standing in relation to the light.

Some people have suggested that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream of black children and white children going forward hand in hand, the ideal of seeing a person not for the color of their skin but for the content of their character, had the goal of a “colorblind” society. That’s a noble ideal on one hand, where we just don’t notice the color of a person’s skin in any situation and go on from there.

But does that truly bring justice to wrongdoing and change society in a way that makes the injustice people have suffered because of that color unacceptable? To suddenly begin to ignore the color of a person’s skin and jump immediately to integration is to jump right over the injustices done to people because of the color of their skin. It’s also ignoring an essential part of another person, shutting the door on a section of their life, a part that makes them distinctive. King did not use the term “colorblind” in any speech or written document, but his point is described by historians as a more “color aware” society where we recognize our differences, celebrate them and thereby heal through those very differences among ourselves.

When I create a piece of visual artwork I look for what makes the subject inspiring to me, what makes it distinctive, what makes me excited to share it with you. I like contrasts, I find what makes my subject different in its class, what makes it stand out from its surroundings. It’s my joy to find and share “the extraordinary in the ordinary”. If everything I painted looked the same, what need would there be for artwork?

Looking at people has always been like looking at a field of flowers for me—I find it hard to settle on one before I skip to another while I enjoy the visually exciting effect of all those different colors and shapes and heights and structures. Then I can can pause on each one and get to know each in its own unique detail.

When I rode the bus, long before I painted anything let alone a human portrait, I quietly studied all the faces around me for color and shape and texture, eye color, the hair that framed it, accessories and jewelry, and was often started by a stern expression of someone who didn’t understand why I studied them so intently. I was just looking for the things that made them unique and beautiful—not in the classic sense of beauty but in the classical sense, in that beauty is truth, in being true to who we are inside showing that on the outside, like the flower in the field that can’t help but be what it is.

If we are colorblind, we intentionally ignore some of the fundamental differences that make each of us irreplaceable. That denies a basic part of our personal existence and of human existence as a species; it denies a portion of our very identity as an individual.

That takes an awful lot of effort. Why not admit to our differences and get to know each other in full, and find the beauty in each of us. We have always been and will always be different from each other and might as well get used to it.

This 1996 essay entitled “Misusing MLK Legacy and the Colorblind Theory” explains more about King’s “color awareness”.

~~~

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.


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Bridal Wreath

bridal wreath
Bridal Wreath

The bridal wreath is beginning to bloom around so many of the older houses in town. Bridal wreath is an old-fashioned shrub, blooming briefly from mid-May to Memorial Day in waves of snowy white blossoms, then to return to a nice, quiet dark green bush.

I read this poem initially at my 2009 poetry reading, “Change of Season”, soon after I’d written it. I read it again at “In This Valley”, my poetry reading to celebrate Carnegie’s 120th birthday, since I felt it was one of those poems that had described life in this town for many, both those mentioned in the poem, and especially my memories of the neighborhoods when I was little. Every house had bridal wreath spirea growing in front, and everyone was immensely proud of it when it bloomed. Cuttings and small shrubs for planting were given to young married couples who’d purchased a new house. As I read, I was surprised to see heads nodding in agreement and smiles. It was familiar to us all.

This poem was inspired by an actual home, more on that after the poem. Because the bridal wreath blooms at this time of year and because the life of the bride I mention are deeply touched by wars, I keep this poem for that time between Mother’s Day and Memorial Day.

Bridal Wreath

Blooming in drifts so dense and tall they hide the entire porch
The bridal wreath greets the May bride
Though she first crossed the threshold decades ago when the shrubs were new,
And placed a vase of the blossoms on her first dinner table,
Has since raised her children,
Lost her son in Viet Nam
And her husband to cancer,
Her daughters moved out
And she has held her grandchildren and great-grandchildren
Through it all the bridal wreath unfailingly welcomed her in the morning every May
In the neighborhood lined with large, neat family homes.
Now the paint is peeling,
Drawn window shades hang in tatters
The bride herself is gone,
Her home the only one remaining on this dusty deserted block
Yet the bridal wreath blooms as fervently as ever this May
Remembering her.

Bridal Wreath ©2009 Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Below is the actual home that inspired this poem. Nothing special about it except that it is the only family home left in what had been a block of these homes, and it’s fenced off because it was shortly thereafter bulldozed for the CVS that now stands there.

House with bridal wreath.
House with bridal wreath.

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.

 


poetry book

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.


Read more:   Essays   ♦  Short Stories  ♦  Poetry

All Rights Reserved.   ♦   © Bernadette E. Kazmarski   ♦   PathsIHaveWalked.com

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Beautiful

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,
but if no eye beholds it, is it still beautiful?
Does the heart truly love, if there is no lover to receive it?
Or does it wait to be beheld, holding within its substance
the essence that needs another to be complete?

Poem © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

I’m participating in the 5 Lines or Less challenge on Patricia’s Place.

 

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