The artist guides our eye to the clutter of the room
and the quality of light on the apples, and we wonder. She
attunes our ear to the scratch of the pen hurrying to write
the most earnest supplications before self-consciousness
takes over. Surely the fact that I worry means something.
Surely my room of so many days holds stories worth
setting down. Consequence is an act of imagination.
Everyone wants to imagine a consequential life. (from In My Room)
A heron slips along the shoreline as if on rice paper. A
great angler, he will place a reflective object on the water's
surface-a pin oak leaf, for example-and watch for a fish
to investigate. The heron's patience, driven by necessity,
far outstrips mine. Fifteen minutes in and I lower the
binoculars to look for other birds. Meanwhile, the green
heron waits, motionless, seemingly dispassionate, until a
fish is in range and he strikes. Is it hyperbole to compare
the jolt to lightning? His long neck shooting out and
snapping back, he breaks the water's surface like a diver
with barely a ripple and comes back with the catch. He is
fed because he waited, quiet and watchful. (from Green Heron)