I have been taking pictures for quite a long time, however being on Flickr for the last couple of years has given me a new reason to press the shutter. This community diverse as it is is like a classroom.
Though I work in a related field (video), my first love is photography. From the moment I slid my first photo paper into developer and saw an image that I created emerge from the developer I was in for the long haul. I am perpetually i intrigued by what happens in the instant when you decide that an image has captured an event that continued in time.
I also write poetry some of which I have posted as comments on my own and others work. Some examples can be seen HERE
and what do I make by hand
not iron, nor pottery,
not candles molded in sand,
nor finely knitted scarves
none of these can I claim
but everything described
can I conjure in my mind
a horseshoe flat and true
dimpled details beat
fresh from the fire
pounded into the curves
as they move
to a finale in a sloping arch
that holds the luck from dripping out
a pot that in a thousand years
described as shards upon a mound
spun by the master on the wheel
and then the blaze deep in the kiln
bakes into a fine tattoo
announcing like a griot
that this is the hardness from the earth
that makes the pulsation of the drum
a flame ignites around a wick
a soft glow given birth
to light expanding from the gloom
magically bringing knowledge from the murk
two hands bringing shape and form
with only nervous ticking sound
the brilliant strands of color dyed
from the Shepard’s harvest of the spring
and yes – this is the work I bring
a few well chosen vowels and consonants
combine to make these images appear
and this is what I made by hand
B I R D
Poem & Image Copyright
© 2007, Frederick Douglass Perry, All rights reserved
to my mom who gave me the children's book
“Frederick” by Leo Leoni
when I was a grown man