Camera Shy

The following photographs were taken in Dublin without the knowledge of the subject.  Most were taken secretly, my camera at my waste and my thumb pressing the trigger every chance I got.  A couple were taken more deliberately. You almost wonder in the faces of some of the people if they know they are being photographed; their eyes seem to be directly facing the lens.  This is all about capturing a moment in life when people least expect it.  I remember seeing a photography exhibition of a photographer who hid a camera in his jacket and took pictures of people on the bus, this is what I thought of while doing this experiment. I tried to get as close to the action as possible to really answer the question: What do you do when know one is looking?

Newgrange

I stand in front of Newgrange, the massive circular mound of earth that is flanked with stone walls all the way around.  I imagine the Neolithic people who built the structure some 5,000 years ago.  What spiritual or political figure might have dedicated the monument when it was completed.  I am transported, back in time, a spectator in the ceremony.

“Welcome my brothers and sisters!  This morning the final stone has been laid, and our monument to the spirit world has been completed.  Each of you have put your blood and sweat into the construction of our shrine.  Some of you have inherited this task that your fathers started, and others have died before they finished what they began.  It is my great honor, bestowed on me by the great gods of the stars, to honor the cycle of everywhen which we all take part. 

The stones that form the foundation for our great monument come from the mountains to the north.  Like the strong base of the mountains, these stones form a base for our structure.  The mountains reach up into the cosmos, where souls of our great shamans live among gods which rule the processes of earth.  Our monument sits atop the substance of the mountains so that the souls that pass through it may be transcended into the cosmos.  The round stones are from the river that passes between us and the Boyne.  The goddess of water shapes these rocks with her mighty torrents.  We honor her as the lifeblood that feeds our crops and ourselves.  Through water, all life is shaped, and through rock all life is formed.  The spirit of these two forces enclose the tomb inside. 

The stone laid in front of the entrance has the everywhen cycle inscribed on it.  These interwoven cycles represent the cycles of life, death and rebirth.  Together, they create everywhen, a continuous cycle with no conceivable beginning or end.  It comprises time and space into one energy, and nothing (not even the gods) is free from it.  Inside the tomb we honor death, but we also honor life and rebirth.  At the winter solstice, a time that marks the death of the harvest and the rebirth of a new year and crop, the great star will shine inside the tomb and illuminate it.  The energy will lift the spirits inside into the cosmos, to join our great spirits of the stars.  This, of course, is reserved for only the greatest of our shamans, so they’re spiritual journey may continue onward from this world.  The younger souls will continue their journey on this place, dying within this cycle like our crop, replenishing our land and being rebirthed in a new age so that one day they may also transcend to the cosmos to continue their spiritual journey. 

I now will also continue my journey into the cosmos, as I sacrifice myself to our new monument, Newgrange.  May you all feast well tonight in celebration of our new achievement.  Let Newgrange persist for millennia, to serve as a humble reminder to future ages of the great scale of everywhen.  Let us not forget that the interwoven lattice of everywhen connects us all, and when one may feel lost they need do nothing else but look inside, for within each of us we are connected to all that is around us.  To Newgrange!”

The entrance to Newgrange in 1905, before any major excavation.

Trigger Happy

I walk up and down the streets looking for something to photograph.  I am getting tired of the same old shot of buildings and streets.  It seems that each photograph is the same, just in a different place and I want something new. I have an idea. I close my aperture, turn on the auto-focus, turn up my ISO and quicken my shutter speed.  I hold my camera at my bellybutton with my right hand, thumb over the trigger.  I nonchalantly walk down the street with my camera at the ready.  A man is walking toward me, hair frizzy and long, I make a subtle adjustment to direct my lens and click a picture.  The sound of the shutter is drowned out by the ambient noise around me.  I keep walking and he never knew he was being captured.  A few people lean against a building, I turn my camera to the side and snap a few pictures.  There is something exciting about this.  The uncertainty of what kind of shot I got and hoping no one has heard the click up my camera as the lens points directly at them.  It excites me and refreshes me from the same old shot; you capture something different, when the subject is oblivious to their attention.

The Big City

The sidewalk size has tripled to account for the massive number of people, which has quadrupled.  Like most Irish cities, it surrounds a river with a bridge every couple of blocks.  Statues of historic figures are all throughout the city, forever shamed by the pigeon poop that runs down their faces.  Flower stalls sit side by side, the owner scowling at the other when a customer chooses the other stall.  Street performers lean toward the theatrical: people dressed as statues or a man frozen in time fighting against a storm, his tie up-side-down from its normal position and his coat flaps flipped up while his frizzy hair pushes behind him.  Big stone buildings, reminiscent of DC architecture hold public institutions like the post office and Trinity College.  Some of the oldest pubs in the city stand two or more stories tall with intricate detail in their molding and up to four or five bars inside.  The city is saturated with historic significance: Kilmainham Goal, a jail which housed numerous political prisoners throughout the Irish revolution and civil war; the stomping grounds of many of famous writers such as James Joyce and Oscar Wilde; the Book of Kells, an illustrated book of the four gospels of Jesus Christ that is now housed in Trinity College; and much more.  This is Dublin.  

A Garden in the City

A tall light green fence lined the parameter.  There was a pond on the right surrounded by a herb garden as you walked in and to the left, rows of rhubarb, onion, carrots, the ever-popular “rocket lettuce” (which we call arugula), and many more plants covered the ground.  Two small greenhouses held tomatoes and “French peas.”  Beyond those two raised beds made an accessible working area for the disabled and on the opposite side bamboo grew on either side of the path leading to the children’s garden.  A small hut made of bamboo housed the pizza oven that they made from clay and straw.  More rows of potatoes grew further back and a row of raspberry bushes grew beyond that.  Opposite of these lay a massive pile of seaweed, which they brought truckloads of from the nearby beach to use as fertilizer.  A small shelter provided protection from the rain in which we enjoyed hot tea, some butter and jam on a scone and freshly made cake.  All sitting on a main road in a more residential part of town, it was across from a bus stop that was between the library and a church.  This was Ballybane Organic Community Garden. 

Taking a Ride on the Rugged Side

Sweat drips down my face as I roll up the sleeves of my flannel.  The road gets progressively rockier and each bump is a pain for my already sore bottom.  I have made it up a steep hill that seemed to only get longer with each downshift of gear.  Surrounding me are the stone fences that I have grown so used to, they go on for miles and miles, and I think to myself how far they could get lined up end to end.  To my right is a slow decent full of the rocky grazing fields before it meets with the Atlantic.  To my left I see the lighthouse, the highest point on Inis Mor and my destination.

           

My legs are tired and burn with each pump of the pedal.  I relax for a second when I approach a small descent.  The bike shakes and I stand on the pedals to reduce the vibrations sharply running up my body from the frame.  Leaning my weight further back the bike goes faster and faster.  Large rocks serve as tiny jumps and I start to forget about the burning sensation in my legs.  “Woohoo!” I yell for only cows and donkeys to hear.  I pedal up the next small incline to descend again, the adrenaline makes me want to go faster and faster. 

The road levels out.  The lighthouse looks slightly behind me.  I get out my map.  I notice that I missed my turn; do I turn back?  I can see the long downhill rocky road before me leading right back to the main town area where the hotel is.  I can either pedal up to the highest point on the island and take the main road back, or pursue this downhill mountain biking adventure.  I pedal forward.

A Resentment

Take this ye path
to fill you fools with gold.
Don't look back,
no one wants to see ye.

Rape my arse,
like you raped so many.
Find ye back here,
and ye will be hated.

Take my fingers,
and cut them off.
You need them more,
to make ye smile.

Find a pot of gold,
and keep it for yeself.
We don't want it,
keep it all for yeself.

We know you will anyway.