The Timekeepers Piece

The TimeKeepers Piece

Higher than the Afghan hills, distant squats an Eastern sun. Tempered by ancestral powder and dust, its glow skims playful above the two thin cows in a field, finds the broken, splayed Toyota truck, waits slight and patient above the sleeping Afghan family two klicks distant from the Americans. Alhib Muhammad snuggles with Aldira, her lips parted, perhaps she is speaking verses in a dream. There has been no fighting for two months. And the Americans have brought irrigation supplies. Poppy seeds are near blossom and he hopes these will make market. He has promised his young wife sandals and a new cooking pot. He falls back into an agreeable dream, one that sometimes visits when he is hopeful.

(My website)

words from a river

Perfection lived in the arc of a great trout, its red burnished against the cool blur of October light.

Yes, the days would be measured and judged against this day,

considered against the scent of burnt cedar caught in my father's Pendleton.

Other days considered, would pale, balance precarious and awkward against the

artful delivery of a mayfly facing these cold dark waters.

This day without fault, would assess the others...

a shaded ebon pool dappled with reckless trout, the line's spray a thousand separate angels.

Rivers Lost

The sun refused and the forest remained, ebon, inside its wintered black, the woodland song lost to a grey that came every morning. What lingered were only ghosts and obscenities killing in the dark. Creek bed waters eddied, gushed in black fluids,without light and life.

It was as if a great moving thing had rooted itself into the land, sightless, fingering the soil, and all the trees and plants succumbed to it, reduced, rootless themselves, grey, deathblanched.

It bore some grinning quality, his scarecrow picking a last gristle from the bone. A terrible harm fell to the land and it remained, the wound, taking the robin, the bear, the green.

Thank you Mr. McCarthy, for the inspiration.......Doug Deacy

unedited images are sneaky little devils

Realizing the inherent beauty (or ugliness, for that matter) of an unedited image is a tough, tough call. Knowing when to work diligently on a raw image can be frustrating. As one calculates the bewildering combinations of filters, layers, software programs, slider controls...the possible mathematical combinations of all these devices must be in the millions. Should you process your image in a photo-realistic manner or blow it out in Photomatix? Should you incorporate black and white through Silver pro? Do you add a new sky or perhaps Photomerge the images together?
Tough call. Perhaps it's wise to take a few moments and just see what the photo tells you. After all, it is akin to a negative, digital but still, a platform from which you can begin. It'll speak quietly.
Is the image serious, dark? Is it playful? Are you dark... or playful? Who is your audience? Writers must answer this question,...so with photographers.
I deal with this eventuality every time I open a photo file. I often rush in, filled with the intoxicating elixir of hope only to discover, rudely, that the photo goes yet again, into the discard pile.
But first things first.
You must begin with a good photo. If you have that, keeping your options open, give that image every chance to succeed.
"What if" works wonders.
If it grows stale, delete layers. They're not etched in photographic gold anyway. Don't be enamored with your artistic greatness...you'll fail as a visual editor. Edit with a ruthless quality but at the same time, leave your current image the chance to develop
Finally... this "soup" is my recipe. It works for me. Will it work for you? That question just illuminates my arrogance.One other point....
As you're getting ready to hit the delete button, ask yourself one question...

"Am I dumping something great??"

Thanks for taking the time...........Doug Deacy


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