Millie was in the backyard hanging the laundry. I was watching her from the kitchen window. Why does this give me so much pleasure? Because I love her in a million ways, and because I love the idea of clean laundry flapping in the wind. It's timeless, a new beginning, a promise of tomorrow. Clothespins! God, I love clothespins. We should stock up on them. Some day they may stop making them, and then what? If I were a painter, I would paint Millie hanging the laundry. That would be a painting that would make you happy, and break your heart. You would never know what was in her mind, big thoughts, little thoughts, no thoughts. Did she see the hawk circling overhead? Did she hate hanging laundry? Was she going to run away with a sailor? The sheets billowing like sails on an ancient skiff, the socks waving goodbye. Millie, O Millie, do you remember me? The man who traveled with cloth napkins and loved you in the great storm.
James Tate
Sunday, September 22, 2019
Untitled (Field of Daisies and Lupins), c. 1978
William Eggleston
Saturday, April 4, 2015
These Fevered Days - to take them to the Forest
Where Waters cool around the mosses crawl -
And shade is all that devastates the stillness
Seems it sometimes this would be all -
Emily Dickinson
Thursday, February 5, 2015
Michael West, 1930
Jon Boris
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
The Blue Sky - Dana, 1923
Edward Steichen
Monday, June 16, 2014
Norma Shearer, Movie Star, ca.1924
Alfred Cheney Johnston
Saturday, June 14, 2014
Lee Miller, 1928 Edward Steichen
Lee Miller, 1929
Man Ray
Tuesday, June 10, 2014
Katherine Dudley, 1922
Alfred Stieglitz
Wednesday, April 23, 2014
You are my song, my dark blue dream
Of doves, of winter's drowsy drone,
And sleighs that slow and golden go
Through gray blue shadows on the snow.