from time to time, a bridge rises out of the darkness of the heart.
there is the grace of the unforeseen, gestures finding each other, as if in a mirror, there is the gentleness of wonder, the wild joy of being, finally, understood, held in the palm of another, across the abyss.
souls strive toward light as pale crocuses, an orange flame of love tearing through them, toward the sky. for a while, there is knowing and sweet unknowing, mouths and fingers fit as if pieces of a puzzle which fall into place, for a while, the death one carries within suddenly doesn't matter, there is the glimpse of skin aglow with shared silences, there is green.
then the bridge recedes into the darkness of hearts.
there is the grace of the unforeseen, gestures finding each other, as if in a mirror, there is the gentleness of wonder, the wild joy of being, finally, understood, held in the palm of another, across the abyss.
souls strive toward light as pale crocuses, an orange flame of love tearing through them, toward the sky. for a while, there is knowing and sweet unknowing, mouths and fingers fit as if pieces of a puzzle which fall into place, for a while, the death one carries within suddenly doesn't matter, there is the glimpse of skin aglow with shared silences, there is green.
then the bridge recedes into the darkness of hearts.
..
The images are so romantic, and the words so painfully honest. There is a growing up within them. Full of love and disillusionment, and still a sense of hope...."Without the rose, we could not do it." (A one line poem
ReplyDeleteby Joseph Beuys.)
gorgeous, as always.
ReplyDeletestunning bridge shot! monsieur monet would have fallen in love i am sure.
wow! did you write those lines or are they cut and past from somewhere else? Lovely writing, R.
ReplyDeleteThis is unspeakably beautiful, both word and image. Transcendent. The irises like flame fed pure Oxygen. "The heart of another is a dark forest."
ReplyDeletewow! these pics are amazing *-*
ReplyDeleteBeautiful, first one.
ReplyDeleteMay your bridges extend forever across all abysses, never crumbling, always staying anchored at each end, allowing you to roam at will into any land that calls you, that warms you, that greets you. The bridge may be the finest human creation, for it opens minds and renders the abyss useless other than a mere shadow that one need not dwell on or linger over... be well dear Roxana...
ReplyDeleteIt takes courage to cross that bridge and strength to turn away from the empty space where it once existed; but hope springs eternal, just as bridges suddenly arise between hearts and crocuses promise the sweetness of renewal.
ReplyDeleteThe contrast between the granular texture of the first image and the purity of the color fields and gradations in the second brings to mind the relationship between ash and the processes of its making. As though the first is rising from the second as smoke from the crucible of the first in a fascinating inversion of our usual apprehension of causality and connectedness, order and disorder. The water which forms the lower third of the black and white picture mirrors the implied heat of the top third of the second, astoundingly beautiful second photograph, as if the first had condensed out of the combustion products of the first.
ReplyDeleteHow you have transformed these flowers into flames is one of the finest pieces of optical magic I have ever seen: I do not know how you did this, but I get the feeling that hours of work must have gone into the creation / metamorphosis of what appears superficially simple yet surely isn't. This is one of your best images. The juxtaposition is beautifully ambiguous: it is unclear whether the rising heat keeps the cascades of water and ash aloft, or whether their sootwater weight might extinguish the bloom of fire at any moment.
There is similar ambiguity in the first and last lines of the text: they seem to fit each other yet closer inspection reveals so many subtleties. "A bridge rises" is matched with "the bridge recedes," "time to time" is paired with "then," the shift between singularity and plurality is continued, reversed, in the pairing of "the darkness of the heart" with "the darkness of hearts." Throughout, what seems to be opposition turns out not to be true opposition.
This is a wonderful complement to the previous post, in which the images of order are parenthesized by depictions of disorder. There is the same parenthesization here, from top to bottom: disorder, then order, then order, then disorder.
Stunning. Absolutely stunning.
hello beautiful Roxana, what a
ReplyDeletemagnificent masterpeice this post is.
thankyou for your past comment to me on the bridge how sweet and wonderful and well I humbly bow down to the bridge as it is one of my heart's masters, (voluntarily so so we can all relax hahaha.)
well when we interpret art it probably has more to do with the viewer than the artist so here is my dream(although you and I have often had our dreams weaved from the same fabric here on the bridge.)
yes I feel mesmerized by the darkness in the first image,it is as pure and strong and beautiful to me as the second, even more so because it is weaved from strength,the second image is not stable enough it is only for "a while" and flies away like a will-o-the whisp too short lived and therefore flagellates the beaten soul it is beautiful in its own rite (I am glad I mispelled that I meant to say right or did I? haha)like a freshly adorned sacrificial altar in the maytime.
but the darkness in the first is exquisitely refined in its profundity and it leads me to beleive that the soul is not really in darkness it is the nighttime and the soul is eclipsed from the sun of the spirit but soon there will be an awakening,forever the awakening as long as there are sunrises strung like the most precious star studded cosmic jewels of awakenings...
sending you starlit kisses
the sheer grace of that unforeseen floating bridge ... incredibly beautiful bridge-photo - very contemplative
ReplyDeletei think michael has made granular my word of the day! i am still in the land of black and white but, even if i wasn't, the texture of that tree would catch my eye every time
ReplyDeleteeines meiner liebsten bilder von dir, liebste roxana und der text ist ganz grosse poesie, es ist ein überweltliches eintauchen in das, was das menschsein so wertvoll macht, und es ist hoffnung für mich...!
ReplyDeletedanke dir, liebste prinzessin, du bringst mir glück!
renée
"Across the abyss..." It is so hurtful. Everyday. How to close the gap, which may only a mirage but seems so painfully real. That second image, for me, has "bridged" that gap. It's exquisite.
ReplyDeleteThis post is really really fine. Close to perfection. What will be closer? Perhaps it is only self-portrait.
ReplyDeleteThe first is like your mind, full of complex, difficult, wondrous thoughts, a bridge to other people and other times. The second is a heart full of memories and a burning desire for the one.
ReplyDeleteanon.
The garish lights of the theater district were reflected in endless lacustrine puddles that stretched mercilessly from street to street. Ambages of narrow streets, from whose subterranean cavities issued pale clouds of fog, were lit by the decrepit streetlamps that once stood sentinel over men's souls. On a particular street, in the pulsing heart of London, strangers, both wearing crinkly brown macintoshes and thwarted by the evening's inclemency, fought to disentangle their umbrellas (always recalcitrant in these situations), both cranberry red, in a covered doorway, amid a distant din of voices from the damp darkness. Their eyes met for a brief moment (a small eternity), and slightly embarrassed by the close proximity afforded by the circumstance, they turned away; it is a wonder that they were able to ascertain that they each held tickets to the same show, yet upon having unearthed this gemstone, they decided to share a cab to the theater, whereupon he mused that the city had suddenly become smaller, more condensed.
ReplyDeleteThe musical, as fully garish as the lights, ended triumphantly (lovelorn thespians finding barbarous bliss). They soon parted company--soon being an imprecise term--and she returned home (in the cispontine sector) only to recede into the irresolute waves of an emerald pillow.
Roxana, I have just found your work and am blown away by it. It is so full of truth and deeply beautiful. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteit's been awhile since i've come here, mostly because i like to save it up so i can spend at least an hour poring over the images and words.
ReplyDeleteso i click on the link and the first thing i read is so close to home, so immediate to my situation.
so bittersweet, this truth. so painful and beautiful. what a gift you are sharing with us, thank you.
cuvintele astea,parca doar iscate,o parere,ca si cand ai asculta ,cu o vigilenta extrema,fosnetul petalelor albe.cred ca doar atunci poti asculta ceea ce spun caliciile florilor poti vorbi cu adevarat,podurile stau in neclintire,ele doar asteapta ca noi sa le trecem,nu se impun nimanui,insa cer atentia cea mare.si,trecandu-le,avand,deci,curajul extrem,te apleci peste marginile lor si vezi ca,da,in jurul tau lumea miscatoare ti se supune,devine oglinda ta,iar tu vei fi din ce in ce mai atent inca-lumea se creeaza cu fiecare soapta.
ReplyDeletesi apoi,da,toate se reintorc in tacerea si intunericul increatului,florile dispar.
the death one carries within suddenly doesn't matter
ReplyDeletei don't know ... perhaps it matters more than ever, only now we are grateful that we carry death ... perhaps only death makes love possible; only the knowledge that it is "for a while" gives it poignancy and depth -- even if it lasts for the remainder of a long life, love is still a bridge over darkness, and the darkness gives the light definition ...
the words and the photos are gorgeous ... anything i can say is the shadow of their shadow, no more than that :-)
myth,
ReplyDeletelovely Beuys. and it is perhaps essential in a way that we tend to overlook or fail to grasp. as a strange coincidence, i watched the news before coming to the Bridge and there was the story of a girl who fell off the balcony, from the 9th floor, and she is still alive, as she happened to land on a rose bush. i couldn't help but thinking about such a poetical contingency. but your comment is prophetic, as there will be roses in my next post :-)
Michael,
thank you!!! the mere thought of Monet falling in love here is enough to make me delirious with joy :-)
billoo,
ReplyDeletethanks, who knows? we can't be sure any longer about what is ours and what comes from the outside :-)
anon, i will always remember this: the heart of another, a dark forest. but i would add: one's heart, a dark forest as well.
Sheng-Hie, thank you for visiting the Bridge and your nice words.
Owen, indeed, the bridge seems to be an archetypal image able of generating a wide range of symbols, i am happy i was so inspired when i chose the title of this blog, though the line doesn't belong to me and has a strong intertextual aspect :-)
yes, Lynne, how would we be able to live (though a typo i had just written: 'love') if not for the promis of sweet renewal which crocuses bring...
ReplyDeleteah, mts,
your praise here makes me a little speechless... thank you... i am so happy you liked them, especially the translucid crocuses.
but then, it is not only praise, but also an amazing piece of ekphrasis (though you said you weren't good at this), combined with literary hermeneutics - an analysis which is so rich and in many instances goes along with the lines i had intended myself... the only thing which makes me wonder is the hint at the supposed superficiality of simplicity - perhaps i didn't get you here. i don't see why simplicity (either as an attribute of the work itself, or of the way of its creative emergence) should be superficial, why hours of hard work here would add to the value of the image, i.e. to the projected value which the reader/viewer instills into the work. no, i am sorry to disappoint you, it didn't take me more than 5 minutes to do this :-) but it is true that i had taken a number of images of the crocuses, and it took longer to go through all of them and decide which one i should keep for this post.
Madeleine, the Bridge as one of your heart's masters, now you make me blush! :-) you really do! what can i say, than that i thank you for this honour from my heart, though to my eyes, the Bridge is too floating/trembling to be anybody's master, let alone itself :-)
ReplyDeletei also thank you for perceiving the purity in the first image as well, it is important to me - and also for offering such an optimistic, full of light and spring fragrance reading of my post :-)
ffflaneur, i also like this Bridge-photo, i don't know it has such a strange charm to my eyes, it must be my affinity with the old masters from the dawn of photography :-)
swiss, ha, granular, indeed, i can see why you would fall for that :-)
Liebste Renée, ach ich bin jetzt ganz beruhigt, ich hatte Angst, dass mein Text hier ein bisschen zu dunkel fuer Dich waere, es ist auch wahr, dass ich mich an jenem Tag nicht so gut gefuehlt hatte und ueber das Ende wertvoller Freundschaftsbeziehungen nachgedacht hatte - aber jetzt sehe ich, Du hast doch die Poesie geniessen und sogar das verheimlichte Licht der Hoffnung sehen koennen, wie sehr freue ich mich darueber :-)
ich wuensche Dir eine schoene ruhige Fruehlingsnacht und melde mich bald wieder :-)
liebste, herzlichste Gedanken fuer Dich...
Stickup, yes, it is hurtful - i was in a very bleak mood when i wrote this, but what matters in the end is the ability to bridge the gap, as you say. and for that, there are always crocuses, and also, images - ah if we didn't have our photography, how much more difficult things would be...
ReplyDeleteanonymous 2&3, i get a feeling that you are the same, or not? anyway, i get the innuendo about posting a self-portrait, we'll see what we can do about that! :-P (i am using the plural form just to make it even :-)
Sharon, thank you so much for visiting and for your warm words of appreciation.
ReplyDeleteProspero,
yet again you offer the Bridge a literary journey into the unfathomable heart du hasard (how come there is no good translation for this word in english, or equivalent?). so much on the Bridge is indeed about this, le hasard, that moment of chance and perhaps grace, which is able to change one's life - or not, if we fail at grasping it. however i am puzzled by this new setting, why London? you couldn't know i have never visited this city, could you?!
but i was thinking about all this only after recovering from my shock; no, it is not the word 'cispontine' which made it, but 'lacustrine', i would have never thought i could ever stumble upon it just like this - and you know why? because it is the title of a very famous romanian poem, here it is, in Cristina Hanganu-Bresch's wonderful translation
LACUSTRINE
by George Bacovia
So many nights I’ve heard the rain,
I’ve heard the matter cry in vain…
I’m lonely, and my putrid brain
Takes me to the lacustrine dwellings.
It seems I sleep on soggy floorboards,
A wave will slap me in my shack—
I shudder in my sleep, and reckon
I didn’t pull the drawbridge back.
An ageless vacuum surrounds me,
I am again under that weather…
And feel the massive rain will cause
The heavy pillars to surrender.
So many nights I’ve heard the rain,
I shudder and I wait in vain…
I’m lonely, and my putrid brain
Takes me to the lacustrine dwellings.
strangepress, what a surprise!!! indeed, it's been quite a long time :-) but i am happy to see you here again, and also to know that you found something to speak to you, so intimately. it's hard, i know.
ReplyDeleteJames, ah, but it is both, both - this is the impossible paradox - for that moment, death is forgotten, for a while, and at the same time only the awareness of death makes us able to live such a forgetfulness deeply, completely, to immerse into it, as if only that moment were real, and absolute - i hope it makes somehow sense, to me it does :-)
Cerasela, ce frumos ai spus tu despre poduri şi neclintirea lor, poate că aşa este tot timpul cu lucrurile cele mai importante, ele nu ne cer nimic, nu impun nimic, dar atunci când trebuie să trecem prin ele, nu reuşim decât dacă le dăm totul, toată atenţia noastră...
what about what comes from the inside then?
ReplyDelete:-)
Why London? Let me answer, cleverly turning the tables, by asking you to use the word 'cispontine' in a sentence. Now dearest, i am aware that you will regard this as a purely rhetorical matter and will decline to answer, a bad habit you picked up ever since that day you went out into the icy cold Craiova wind without a scarf. It is no wonder that i, on the other hand, being endowed with uncommon bonhomie, will answer your query with a tang of homiletics and, not uncharacteristically, a full complement of alacrity.
ReplyDeleteThose of you who dream in French will no doubt have come across, at some critical moment of the dream, a personage that has sung "Sur le pont d'Avignon," most probably in a blood-tingling baritone. Pons/Pont is Latin for bridge (how fitting for these floating pages!) and the French have conveniently stolen it for use in their little ditty about Avignon. Naturally the English, equally able thieves, with great fanfare some time later launched the word 'pontoon' (or was it earlier, it's so fuzzy to me now). All this to say that the
'pontine' part of 'cispontine' means bridge. But still, what does this have to do with London? You are so impatient, dearest! Transpontine, it's etymology now as clear to you as violet-hued crocuses emerging from a patch of vernal snow, refers to the south side of the Thames, the side of the bridge where the theater district is located. Cispontine signifies the other side, the side where our hapless heroine lives, the respectable side. We do not, however, know where the counterpart of our star-crossed lovers lives--perhaps he lives among transpontine puellae publicae or, and this is always a possibility, he is simply a glint on the waters of the heroine's wavy imagination. i will let you draw your own conclusions regarding the wondrous nature of this encounter.
Hazard has long been a favorite word, though its subtleties have been subsumed into the exhausted language of 'risk management,' and not many English speakers use it well. I think it performs perfectly the job originally assigned to it in some Arabic gaming hall (it means 'the die [that is] cast' as well as the act of hazarding the casting of the die - it does not, to me, mean 'risk' but something more akin to the Greek Kairos, the seizing of the forelock, the abandonment not to fate but to happenstance, fortune, 'happiness' in an archaic sense). In its origins and connotations it relates, curiously, to those Princes of Serendip, too. (:
ReplyDeleteI loved Prospero's entangled umbrellas; a beautiful envisioning!
Of course one should not forget the neurological meaning of 'Pons,' either: it is very pertinent to the Bridge. Amygdalic, conduit of emotion's bases, stiller of sleep and, through this nocturnal paralysis, enabler of hypnogogia and memory, conjuror of visions, floater of dreams.
(I think superficial was the wrong word: 'the apparency of simplicity' I guess. Hazard, again, in the choosing.)
Un moment suspendu entre la triste froideur hivernale et la fraiche lumière printanière...
ReplyDeletej'aime me balader entre ces deux alternatives...:)
Prospero,
ReplyDeletethank you for this most elaborate clarification, so poetical that, as i reached its end, i had almost forgotten my still-alive perplexity: do you mean to tell me that you chose this very complicated London-setting only to be able to use the word' cispontine'??? ;-)
i have always thought that pons/pont is a much lovelier word than its germanic counterpart bridge/Brücke, but then the latter, i mean Brücke, diminishes the phonetic disadvantage by choosing the feminine gender, instead of the masculine 'le pont', all bridges should be feminine! (of course at this point English has already become obsolete in the discussion ;-). unfortunately Romanian has opted, exactly in this case, for a very uninspired slavic 'pod', i don't like this word much (while other slavic borrowings are absolutely delights).
oh, and as to the Pont d'Avignon, i prefer Le Pont Mirabeau, of course :-)
mts,
ReplyDelete'hazard' is one of those words, isn't it? poets have built an entire ars poetica around it, may i recall one of the most famous and mysterious lines in french poetry, Un Coup de Dés jamais n’abolira le Hasard - A Throw of the Dice will Never Abolish Chance... one of the possible interpretations would focus on the tension between intention/choice and hasard, chance, also happenstance, kairos, you are right, in the process of writing, of making a work of art... it is also a very useful concept in pondering about photography as well...
the neurological Pons, now that is really an insight, yes, yes!
clo, ma chere!!!
ReplyDeletecomme je suis heureuse de te revoir ici :-)
je t'embrasse de tout coeur, maintenant l'oscillation s'est deja decidee en faveur du printemps :-)