A friend’s neighbor has an aviary and a tortoise who seeing an open gate escapes. I never thought of tortoises having a desire for escape, but as my friend says they are patient in their travels. We all know Aesop’s fable of the tortoise and the hare. Seeing this tortoise, I’m reminded of the movie Lucky by David Lynch which shows the power of diligence and determination. I recommend the movie, and honoring strength in a tortoise pace and grace.
Because I love the poetry of Jane Hirshfield, I loved this interview with her on YouTube at “Jane Hirshfield at PoetryEAST”.
I return to many of her poems but this is one of my favorites. From watching this interview I learned that most of her poems come from what she’s experienced or seen. This is not imagined. It’s “real” though the leap of vision is hers, “To be that porous, to have such largeness pass through me”.
The quiet opening
between fence strands
perhaps eighteen inches.
Antlers to hind hooves
four feet off the ground
the deer poured through.
No tuft of the coarse white belly hair left behind.
I don’t know how a stag turns
into a stream, an arc of water,
I have never felt such accurate envy.
Not of the deer:
To be that porous, to have such largeness pass through me.
– Jane Hirshfield
My friend Mirka Knaster, a member of Fiber Dimensions, a group of highly talented fiber artists in the Bay Area has a blog focused on art, specifically fiber. In this post she writes about the Chiharu Shiota exhibit currently at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco.
Mirka writes: Yarn installations are Shiota’s way of “painting” three-dimensionally, outside of a canvas. The thread functions the way a line does in a painting. Strands of red yarn are connective webs that resemble blood vessels or neurons in the brain. In Diary, papers and photographs are embedded in the web. Shiota says: “When the body is gone, the objects which surrounded them [sic] remain behind….As I wander the stalls of the markets in Berlin, I find especially personal items like photographs, old passports and… diaries. Once, I found a diary from 1946, which was an intimate insight into the person’s life and experiences. While [I am] looking at those [handwritten] pages, their inner self is revealed, and I can feel their presence.” This installation reflects on the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II through lingering traces of history in the objects Shiota finds and in the absence of the humans who once had them.
Check out her post: https://www.mirkaart.com/blog/2026/7/14/symbolic-red
It’s only on view at the Asian Art Museum until July 27. https://asianart.org
Here is Shiota’s website: https://www.chiharu-shiota.com/top
This morning I noticed the darkness at 5:15. Yes, the fog is in but still there’s that sense of the tilt toward fall. I’m with the plants and creatures that survive at low tide, and then, again in the high tide, the covering, renewing, feeding, fertilizing.
Today I was again at Rodeo Beach. I was surprised to see a hole in a rock I’ve taken zillions of pictures of but today the light and the closeness to it with the low tide allowed me to see right through it. I often see it as different animals, and today again invited imagining like looking at clouds.
In the photo below, what do you see? Is it a giant Heron next to a tiny house? It’s actually a full-sized playhouse with a normal sized Great Blue Heron standing next to it, but the Heron is in front of the house on a hill, and the camera angle skews sizing. In this way, Trump continues to distort what we know and see. He’s the one in power. He’s the one who shows tampering in the election process and yes China and Russia may be involved with their bots, but they are on the side of Trump, not the side of “we the people”. Who benefits from Trump’s policies? The super rich, and their money and news sources support Trump. Vote his cronies out!
My teacher of Sensory Awareness would say “A moment is a moment.” This morning I woke up to those words. There’s something about going through old photos that makes that so clear. All those moments.
I spent time yesterday in the garden after seeing photos of each reincarnation. It’s filled in beautifully, a gift.
I came across this photo from a neighbor’s garden, a paradise of flowers and birds. May we each have access to the garden within and this garden we share, and may we cultivate what matters to us now, and now, and now.
Recognizing I was going to need to delete some photos or pay more for storage, I settled into what I expected to be a small task, perhaps an hour or so, but then I began. I had around 36,000 photos, starting in 2006. I started slowly, and then began to build. I’ve now deleted 6,541 photos and 50 videos. I see that I probably have more photos of Great Blue Herons, Egrets, and Rodeo Beach than anyone on the planet. My grandson is also a well-photographed treasure trove. In February, 2023, I resided on a houseboat in Sausalito. That’s where I really got into taking photos. It was a small boat and at low tide, the egrets and herons could walk around it, so I would walk around the outside of the boat following them and taking pictures. Mt. Tam was also a favorite. On February 24th it snowed on Mt. Tam, a rare event, and naturally I have photos to re-visit.
I was thrilled when I saw a Great Blue Heron at Abbott’s Lagoon. Then I saw the Great White Egret next to it. I approached closer and closer, and still they were quietly enjoying the view, and then, at times, busy grooming. Even birds, get ready for the day. They weren’t bothered as I circled round them, entranced with their ability to cleanse, appreciate, and savor what we all share, the gift of life!
Yesterday I drove out to Abbott’s Lagoon in Point Reyes. It was early, sunny, and warm. I was alone. I’ll show pictures of my walk, and then, in the next post zero in on more photos of a Great Blue Heron and Great White Egret grooming with a view. I also saw across the lagoon what I knew must be otters since they hang out there, and slide down the dunes, and also groom. This was a huge lump that stayed still, and was gone when I returned. I came home and zoomed in on the lump. Otters huddle together in what’s called a “romp”. For sure, two otters, but I think there’s also two babies. It’s that time of year. Quite a day. I’ll try to give a taste with photos.
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