GREEN CORN, cornfield panorame, photo by Mary Stebbins. This is a HUGE picture, so it looks rather silly this small. 

Before and after, Part One, Margaret at Loretto. The first shot is the one given to me by the camera. In Picasa, I brightened it, warmed it, increased the saturation slightly. I thought it improved both the look and the mood of the picture. I coudl work on it in photoshop, and clean up the background, but I don't have time now. 

Day Lily at Dusk

Day Lily at Dusk, photo and manipulation by Mary Stebbins. Dedicated to Mick Mather. This is a continuation of the series started in the previous post.

Day Lily on Picasa: top L, original, top R my pick, bottom L, filtered BW turned sepia
(for Pam), bottom R sat and blurred (an experiment). Photos and manipulations by Mary Stebbins 

Original of Evening Campion

Original. Both of the pictures shown below were taken at Cranbrook, but I accidentally misrepresented the Evening Campion--I had already cropped and tweaked it slightly in the "before" picture. The other thing is that the composite does not show the final cropping correctly on either shot. I'm not sure the differences are even perceptible in these small postings. In the larger ones, the after pictures are clearly better (I think!)

DRAFT! Before and After: These were illustrations for other blogs and this shot shows the minor changes I made in the photos before and after I posted them. 

A Sudden Change of Seasons, poetry (again)

I am obsessed and keep changing the line breaks. And lines. AK! I'm trying for a certain effect, but can't afford the time to keep working on this now.

A Sudden Change of Seasons

A family trip to the city stalls

when, in stacks at a crowded bookstore,

seeking books in ancient

Greek and Latin, my father

disappears. Aisles now oddly empty.

My mother and I bump

into each other searching

for my father. Calling his name. It is later

than we thought. We’ve missed

the downtown bus. Eat lunch instead

in an uptown outdoor café. In the sun.

Between planters of petunias and golden

honey locusts, we watch

for my father. I think I see him,

an anonymous man

in a brown felt hat and flapping trench coat

headed our way with a package of books

tied in brown twine. The city bus

blocks him from sight, won’t stop

when I try to flag it down. When it is gone

without us, my father is gone

again, too. I think he’s vanished

into the city until I spot him

sledding

with a group of children,

running up the snowy hill

with an air mattress. Face full of fun

and light, he turns, waves once,

and continues on

without us.

Mary Stebbins

For Pa

[050616a, 050615b, 050409-3b, 020217-2x, 1]

A Sudden Change of Seasons, poetry

I'm like a bulldog with a bone. I get my teeth into something and I can't let go. Sometimes I don't go far enough, but sometimes, I go too far. Jo(e) tells me, no, no, I like the earlier one better. Not this poem, but 12 others. Briget Pageen Kelly repeats jo(e)'s words, like a litany.

I've left the other vesion of this I was working on somewhere. I have to go find it. But see, what I was doing here was changing the line breaks to emphasize certain words to make me not have to say to the reader, look, this is what is happening here. I hope they understand. Maybe they did already. I need to know when to trust that I've said enough, trust the reader, and when to say more--unpack those images.

A Sudden Change of Seasons

We started on a family trip to the city, but

in stacks at a crowded bookstore,

searching for books in ancient

Greek and Latin, my father

disappears. The aisles are now oddly empty.

Only my mother and me, bumping

into each other in our frantic search.

It is later

than we thought. We’ve missed

the downtown bus. Eat lunch instead

in Liverpool, at a outdoor café. In the sun.

Between planters of petunias and golden

honey locusts, we watch for my father.

I think I see him,

an anonymous man

in a brown felt hat and flapping trench coat

headed our way with a package of books

tied in brown twine. The city bus

blocks him from sight, won’t stop

when I try to flag it down. When it is gone

without us, my father is gone

again, too. I think he’s vanished

into the city until I spot him

sledding

with a group of children,

running

up the snowy hill with an air mattress.

Face full of fun and light,

he turns, waves once,

and continues on

without us.

Mary Stebbins

For Pa

[050615b, 050409-3b, 020217-2x, 1]

I don't like orphan lines, so for that reason alone, this isn't done yet. Comments? (jo(e)--don't be worried if you suggested something I didn't add it yet, I don't have the copies up here right now!)

Mountain mists 

Indian Pass, Photo by Mary Stebbins