I love the arts (obviously). I think I have wanted to be several different types of artists over my life. I remember wanting to draw when I was young (I think I was better at it when I was 10 than I am now), and I wanted to be a published poet, and then I fell in love with photography. However, I still wrote poetry and songs all throughout high school. Maybe it was just a form of expression or release from “teenage angst” or maybe it was just me not utilizing my full creativity and it was exploding out of me. Who knows. I had notebooks full of poems, that I don’t think I still own any of which makes me a little sad. I doubt they were the greatest, but it would be nice to go back and read my thoughts back then. Occasionally I will still just hear a line that could be in a poem, and write it down but I think most of my creativity is being channeled elsewhere.
While I have never been any good at painting, I still love going to museums and could spend hours looking at the exhibits. About 10 years ago I was lucky enough to visit Santa Fe, and I was able to visit the Georgia O’Keeffe museum, and they were also displaying some of Andy Warhol’s pieces. I had learned a fair amount about her in some of my photography classes as she was married to Alfred Stieglitz, who also spent a lot of time with Ansel Adams. However, one of my favorite displays was in the Phoenix Art Museum, and viewing a lot of Richard Avedon’s work. I strongly suggest viewing his images if you haven’t ever. I think that my fondness for, and my knowledge of all these forms of art inspires me in different and unique ways.
So, I leave you with one of my favorite poems. It’s kind of morbid, but I always thought it was beautiful.
Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.
We slowly drove, he knew no haste,
And I had put away
My labor, and my leisure too,
For his civility.
We passed the school, where children strove
At recess, in the ring;
We passed the fields of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.
Or rather, he passed us;
The dews grew quivering and chill,
For only gossamer my gown,
My tippet only tulle.
We paused before a house that seemed
A swelling of the ground;
The roof was scarcely visible,
The cornice but a mound.
Since then ’tis centuries, and yet each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses’ heads
Were toward eternity
–Emily Dickinson
