Who is my father in this world, in this house,
At the spirit's base?
My father's tather, his father's tather, his -
Shadows like winds
Go back to a parent before thought, before speech,
At the head of the past.
They go to the cliffs of Moher rising out of the mist,
Above the real,
Rising out of present time and place, above,
The wet, green grass
This is not landscape, full of the somnambulations
Of poetry
And the sea. This is my father or, maybe,
It is as he was,
A likeness, one of the race of fathers: earth
And sea and air.
"Reading NADIR: RETURNING HOME brought this poem to mind. while no "Cliffs of Moher" can be found near my East Lansing, Michigan, home; nonetheless, portals abound to Steven's mystic past everywhere - most rather more humble and ordinary than majestic and far-away. And one of the wonders of photographing is witnessing these places where I am transported home to a home far beyond the obvious. I honor my childhood home - wonderful, loving parents and siblings; nurturing that helped my growth in every way - but still, when my father asked, "A penny for your thoughts, Jim" - and he asked me often, I could never articulate where my imaginings had taken me. My parents are both gone now, but if they were able to view the photographs I've taken lately, they would see in the images glimpses into my imagination. Glimpses into moments and places where the world opens to a time beyond time - the timeless home of my heart's longing. Returning, as T.S. Eliot would have it, to "where I began" for moments of bliss, followed by return from forever, back into the world as it is. My photogtraphs, remnants - remnants of inner journeys home to share with others."
-Jim colando, December 15, 2007