James Jowers, Tompkins Sq. Park (1967)
Nel suo profondo vidi che s’ interna,
legato con amore in un volume…I saw within its depth how it conceives all things in a single volume bound by love…
— Dante Alighieri, “The Divine Comedy: Paradiso”
Frances S. Allen, “The difficult step” (ca. 1900)
OH that those lips had language! Life has passed
With me but roughly since I heard thee last.
Those lips are thine—thy own sweet smile I see,
The same that oft in childhood solaced me;
Voice only fails, else how distinct they say,
‘Grieve not, my child, chase all thy fears away!’
— William Cowper, “On the Receipt of My Mother’s Picture out of Norfolk”
Photograph by John Loengard from “The Magic Of A Summer House” (LIFE Magazine, 1969)
lost
I really miss you
because I need to ask
where do I go
now?
— J.S.
This was my Mom’s recipe from the 60’s as best as I can remember it.
Ingredients:
1. ground beef
2. diced onions
3. diced green peppers
4. eggs
5. seasoned bread crumbs
6. garlic powder
7. ketchup
Serve with mashed potatoes and peas.
Educational Screen and Audiovisual Guide Magazine, 1961
a gift
you held me and sang
come fly with me,
said the little red sled
and you gave me the wings of a bird
— J.S.
cf. photograph by Tookapic via Pexels
I was overcome with remorse…because I hadn’t lived up to her expectations.
— Ionesco, The Hermit
Miroslav Sido, “Mother”
As from the house your mother sees
You playing round the garden trees,
So you may see, if you will look
Through the windows of this book,
Another child, far, far away…
That lingers in the garden there.
— Robert Louis Stevenson, “To Any Reader” (excerpt)
F. J. Bandholtz, “Rock Island…” (detail) (ca. 1907)
Peter Ilsted, Mother and Child in an Interior (1898)
“Sensorium”
1965: a song – “Come fly with me, said the little red sled”
1966: a hand in my hand on a frozen pond
1967: a poem – “Then there’s a pair of us–don’t tell!”
1968: a rush of perfume and cold air to say goodnight
1969: a light in the darkness
“Nessun maggior dolore
Che ricordarsi del tempo felice
Nella miseria…”
—J.S., “Sensorium”
James Jowers, Tompkins Sq. Park (1967)
Nel suo profondo vidi che s’ interna,
legato con amore in un volume…I saw within its depth how it conceives all things in a single volume bound by love…
–Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Paradiso
Peter Ilsted, Mother and Child in an Interior (1898)
Charles O’Rear, Mom takes a picture of the kids with railroad personnel at the Wenatchee, Washington depot (1974)
Then, quite mechanically and more distinctly, the conversation began again inside him…
“What was it all for—her struggle?”
That was his despair wanting to go after her.
“You’re alive.”
“She’s not.”
“She is—in you.”
Suddenly he felt tired with the burden of it.
“You’ve got to keep alive for her sake,” said his will in him. Something felt sulky, as if it would not rouse.
“You’ve got to carry forward her living, and what she had done, go on with it.”
But he did not want to. He wanted to give up.
“But you can go on with your painting,” said the will in him…
—D.H. Lawrence, Sons and Lovers
Nobody else could ever know
The part of me that can’t let go…
Jack Delano, Untitled Photograph (detail) (1940)
One white morning, you awoke to find
your black feathers rooted in the lake’s early freeze.
Your friends had fled. Across the gelid expanse,
I answer your haunting call.
Here I am. Look at me. Talk to me.
—Margo Button, “With No Explanation” (excerpt)
Harold Gilman, Edwardian Interior (c.1907)
Where now?
Her secrets: old featherfans, tasselled dancecards, powdered with musk, a gaud of amber beads in her locked drawer. A birdcage hung in the sunny window of her house when she was a girl…
Phantasmal mirth, folded away: muskperfumed.
And no more turn aside and brood.
Folded away in the memory of nature with her toys.
—James Joyce, Ulysses
John Sapiro 