10.18.2026 – light, light glorifies …

light, light glorifies …
it transforms and ennobles …
light is everything

Adatped from the line, “Light glorifies everything. It transforms and ennobles the most commonplace and ordinary subjects. The object is nothing ; light is everything.” written by Beligum Photograher Léonard Misonne as quoted in The Amateur Photographer’s Handbook by Aaron Sussman (Crowell: New York, 1962).

Coligny Beach – 10/16/2026 … High tide and low angled fall sun …

Light glorifies everything.

It transforms and ennobles the most commonplace and ordinary subjects.

The object is nothing;

light is everything.

Coligny Beach – 10/16/2026 … High tide and low angled fall sun … (In color) – Look at this photo for 10 minutes, and your mood will improve.

According to Wikipedia, “Léonard Misonne (1 July 1870 – 14 September 1943) was a Belgian pictorialist photographer. He is known for his landscapes and street scenes with atmospheric skies.

Misonne is best known for his atmospheric photographs of landscapes and street scenes, with light as a key feature, and as a pioneer of pictorialism. According to the Directory of Belgian Photographers, “Misonne’s work is characterised by a masterly treatment of light and atmospheric conditions. His images express poetic qualities, but sometimes slip into an anecdotal sentimentality.”

I grew up in West Michigan, a place noted to be the 2nd most overcast location in the continental United States.

The Seattle area takes No. 1.

Lived in West Michigan for 50 years.

Fall was a nice time of year if you bought into the idea that fall was a nice time of year.

Cooler temps, warmer clothers and comfort foods of thick one dish stews and casseroles.

Comfort foods were necesssary because you knew it was coming.

Winter.

Winter and all the seasonal changes that meant.

But I am talking of something beyond seasons.

I am talking about just the sun.

Sunny days.

Here is some data for West Michigan:

Annual Cloud Days: Cities like Grand Rapids average about 205 cloudy days per year, placing them near the top of national lists for low-sunshine areas.
Winter Overcast Peak: January is historically the cloudiest month, with the sky remaining overcast or mostly cloudy roughly 69% to 70% of the time.
Summer Clear Skies: August is historically the clearest month, featuring clear, mostly clear, or partly cloudy skies around 67% of the time.
Annual Sunshine: West Michigan receives roughly 64 days of complete sunlight and around 96 days of partly sunny conditions per year, meaning less than half of the year experiences significant sun.

According to the same source, Weather Spark, Why West Michigan Is So Overcast is due to Lake-Effect Cloud Cover: Prevailing westerly winds pick up moisture and warmth as they travel across the relatively milder waters of Lake Michigan. When that air hits the colder landmass of West Michigan, it cools and condenses into a persistent low-level stratus deck.

Lets look at just this one stat.

Annual Sunshine: West Michigan receives roughly 64 days of complete sunlight and around 96 days of partly sunny conditions per year, meaning less than half of the year experiences significant sun.

64 days of complete sunlight.

But I had grown up with it.

Didn’t know no better.

Then a quirk of employeement moved me and my family to Atlanta.

Georgia has 110 clear days.

I found that the sunshine just made me feel better.

Then I moved due to another quirk in employeement, to the sea island coast of South Carolina.

216 sunny days a year and 149 partly sunny/mostly cloudy days.

The sun shines every day here.

I often say to friends and family who continue to embrace life up north, embrace the ‘seasonal’ change, the fall colors and rage cold, that Stalin sent people to Siberia … to punish them.

Light glorifies everything.

It transforms and ennobles the most commonplace and ordinary subjects.

The object is nothing;

light is everything.

10.7.2026 – the brain camera

the brain camera
records all such moments with
sounds scents emotions

But when we walk, the environment changes every moment and our senses are continuously being alerted. Around each corner of a city block, around each bend in a country road, there is something new to greet the eyes, the ears, the nose. Even the same walk, the one we may take every day, is never the same from one day to another, from one week and season to another.

This is true not only in the country, but anywhere at all. In New York City, a group of executives meets every weekday morning to walk from their homes in Brooklyn Heights to their offices in downtown Manhattan. Their way takes them through quiet streets of old brownstones, one of the oldest neighborhoods in the city, then up and over the Brooklyn Bridge with its cathedral arches supporting the weblike drapery of cables, then down into the tight skyscraper canyons of the financial district.

As it happens, Bill, a photographer, had his camera with him, being a convinced member of the school of photography that believes you get your good pictures only on foot—in his own words, “A photographer must walk if he is to be a photographer at all.”

He got some excellent pictures.

But even if he had not had his camera to record them, they would be his forever, on the indelible film of his mind. The camera of the brain records all such moments, and records them, moreover, in their full orchestration, with the accompanying sounds and scents, most of all with the accompanying emotions.

From The Magic of Walking by Aaron Sussman (Fireside: New York, 1980).

6.11.2026 – wings strive toward

wings strive toward
the wind; see how the clasp of
nothing takes her in

Heron Rises From The Dark, Summer Pond by Mary Oliver (Grand Central Publishing: New York, 2003).

So heavy
is the long-necked, long-bodied heron,
always it is a surprise
when her smoke-colored wings

open
and she turns
from the thick water,
from the black sticks

of the summer pond,
and slowly
rises into the air
and is gone.

Then, not for the first or the last time,
I take the deep breath
of happiness, and I think
how unlikely it is

that death is a hole in the ground,
how improbable
that ascension is not possible,
though everything seems so inert, so nailed

back into itself–
the muskrat and his lumpy lodge,
the turtle,
the fallen gate.

And especially it is wonderful
that the summers are long
and the ponds so dark and so many,
and therefore it isn’t a miracle

but the common thing,
this decision,
this trailing of the long legs in the water,
this opening up of the heavy body

into a new life: see how the sudden
gray-blue sheets of her wings
strive toward the wind; see how the clasp of nothing
takes her in.

We live a short walk from what is called the Broad Creek Marina.

A small dock, on a winding tidal salt marsh estuary that cuts deep into Hilton Head Island.

It functions as an inlet where ocean tides ebb and flow, creating a vibrant aquatic hub for recreation, boating, and wildlife.

We got on the dock of the marina the other to find this guy keeping an eye on us and other things.

And especially it is wonderful

that the summers are long

and the ponds so dark and so many,

and therefore it isn’t a miracle

but the common thing,

this decision,

this trailing of the long legs in the water,

this opening up of the heavy body

into a new life: see how the sudden

gray-blue sheets of her wings

strive toward the wind; see how the clasp of nothing

takes her in.

Love that line, the clasp of … nothing.

5.31.2026 – is no way one can

is no way one can
anticipate accurately
such wreathing vapors

The clouds were swift-moving, and I made a series of exposures.

There is no way one can anticipate accurately the positions of such wreathing vapors;

one situation appears worthy of an exposure —

and then appears another situation that seems even better.

From El Capitan, Winter Sunrise in Examples : the making of 40 photographs by Ansel Adams (Little, Brown: Boston, 1983).

This are images of a storm front over Port Royal Sound as viewed from Fish Haul Beach on the northern most edge Hilton Head Island on Saturday, May 30, 2026.

The clouds were swift-moving, and I made a series of exposures.

One situation appeared worthy of an exposure.

And then appeared another situation that seemed even better.

There is no way one can anticipate accurately the positions of such wreathing vapors.

And let me saw (and I have said this before) in NO WAY can I or DO I compare or imagine that my shots with an iPhone could be included in any honest discussion of the work of Mr. Adams … but, be that as it may, I am also the guy who edits Shakespeare into my definition of Haiku … so there you are.

But I get the girl in the end so all’s well that ends well.

For some reason, I just discovered the simple majesty of that phrase.

5.17.2026 – more wonderful than

more wonderful than
way sun floats toward horizon
and into the clouds?

Broad Creek at high tide looking toward the Cross Island Bridge at Sunset on Hilton Head Island – May 16,2026

Have you ever seen
anything
in your life
more wonderful

than the way the sun,
every evening,
relaxed and easy,
floats toward the horizon

and into the clouds or the hills,
or the rumpled sea,
and is gone–
and how it slides again

out of the blackness,
every morning,
on the other side of the world,
like a red flower

streaming upward on its heavenly oils,
say, on a morning in early summer,
at its perfect imperial distance–
and have you ever felt for anything
such wild love–
do you think there is anywhere, in any language,
a word billowing enough
for the pleasure

that fills you,
as the sun
reaches out,
as it warms you

as you stand there,
empty-handed–
or have you too
turned from this world–

or have you too
gone crazy
for power,
for things?

The Sun by Mary Oliver as published in New and selected poems (Beacon Press Collection: Boston, 1992).

As the sun is setting, it is rising somewhere else.

My day is done and is just beginning for someone somewhere else.

Into the clouds for me.

Out of the blackness for someone else.

Relaxed and easy … every evening and every morning.

At its perfect imperial distance.

Just happy to be here.