Home for Old and Disabled Cactus

Some cactus live for hundreds of years, but that does not mean that they survive without injury. Despite their spines, cactus are vulnerable to a host of infections, drought, and physical destruction. The cause of the growth pattern on this cactus, usually called cresting, is unknown and it is relatively uncommon. It does appear on a variety of different cactus species. Here is an appropriate poem.

You are a child of the universe,
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

From Desiderata by Max Ehrmann

In Self Defense

I know I have been posting a lot of photos of cactus but when these photos were taken, it was a really good day to photograph cactus. I didn't find any good poetry about cactus. I might start writing poetry about cactus but right now photography is about the only extra thing I can do. Here is a poem anyway, even if it doesn't relate to cactus.

Good reader! if you e'er have seen,
When Phoebus hastens to his pillow
The mermaids, with their tresses green,
Dancing upon the western billow:
If you have seen, at twilight dim,
When the lone spirit's vesper hymn
Floats wild along the winding shore:
If you have seen, through mist of eve,
The fairy train their ringlets weave,
Glancing along the spangled green;--
If you have seen all this and more,
God bless me! what a deal you've seen!

If You Have Seen by Thomas Moore

Sticking to the Light

As a photographer, I try to see those parts of the world that are always there but hardly noticed. Everywhere I look I see photographs. When you look at my photos, you will not see what I saw, but you will see what your world view lets you see. In essence, I paint with light. I create a world that cannot be duplicated but is always around us. Thousands of people walk by these small cactus every day. How many of them actually looked at them? Here is a poem that seems appropriate.

What does it mean? Tired, angry, and ill at ease,
No man, woman, or child alive could please
Me now. And yet I almost dare to laugh
Because I sit and frame an epitaph--
"Here lies all that no one loved of him
And that loved no one." Then in a trice that whim
Has wearied. But, though I am like a river
At fall of evening when it seems that never
Has the sun lighted it or warmed it, while
Cross breezes cut the surface to a file,
This heart, some fraction of me, hapily
Floats through a window even now to a tree
Down in the misting, dim-lit, quiet vale;
Not like a pewit that returns to wail
For something it has lost, but like a dove
That slants unanswering to its home and love.
There I find my rest, and through the dusk air
Flies what yet lives in me. Beauty is there

Beauty by Edward Thomas

Mountain clouds

Sometimes we have only a narrow view of life. We cannot see even one minute into the future. But it is important that we do not allow ourselves to become narrow-minded simply because we are afraid of that future. We need to always be aware that there is more to life than meets the eye immediately.
Here is a poem about distant mountains.

Upon the Mountain’s Distant Head
William Cullen Bryant, 1794 - 1878

 Upon the mountain’s distant head,
   With trackless snows for ever white,
Where all is still, and cold, and dead,
   Late shines the day’s departing light.

But far below those icy rocks,
   The vales, in summer bloom arrayed,
Woods full of birds, and fields of flocks,
   Are dim with mist and dark with shade.

’Tis thus, from warm and kindly hearts,
   And eyes where generous meanings burn,
Earliest the light of life departs,
   But lingers with the cold and stern.

Columbine

We are still waiting for the first daffodil of Spring. A shaft of light from under the cloud shot over the valley and illuminated the bright green of the new leaves on the hillside. Today may not be the official first day of Spring, but with flowers growing and the sun warming, we are well on our way to not minding the calendar.  Here is part of a poem about Spring.

Now that the winter's gone, the earth hath lost
Her snow-white robes, and now no more the frost
Candies the grass, or casts an icy cream
Upon the silver lake or crystal stream;
But the warm sun thaws the benumbed earth,
And makes it tender; gives a sacred birth
To the dead swallow; wakes in hollow tree
The drowsy cuckoo, and the humble-bee.
Now do a choir of chirping minstrels bring
In triumph to the world the youthful Spring.

The Spring by Thomas Carew

Amazing Designs

One of the reasons that I love cactus so much is their amazing designs. If you look closely at this small cactus you will see that each of spines are part of a perfect cross. Every one of the cactus in this cluster has exactly the same pattern. This regularity in design is truly amazing.

Don't touch!

You might guess from all my photos that I love cactus and you would be right. Cactus are examples of the adaption of form to the environment. As humans, we mostly live in very energy inefficient surroundings. There are about 2000 identified cactus species in the world and each one of them has evolved a unique way of balancing their major environmental challenges while many produce gorgeous flowers and some produce edible fruit. Maybe we should evolve the way we live to have a greater balance with our own environment.