Larry Burrows

“I must mention Larry Burrows in particular. To us younger men who had not yet earned reputations, he was a sainted figure. He was a truly beautiful man, modest, graceful, a star who never behaved like one. He was generous to all, a man who gave lessons to his colleagues not just on how to take photographs but, more important, on how to behave like a human being, how to be both colleague and mentor. Our experience of the star system in photography was, until we met him, not necessarily a happy one; all too often talent and ego seemed to come together in equal amounts. We were touched by Larry: How could someone so talented be so graceful?” David Halberstam

 

Organic Metaphysicum

I grow like a plant. I rise like the sun. Unnoticed I come. Slowly like nature without missing a step. I brought the perfect parts together. I held them so close but could not make them one. But in me a great light has released and behold they are One. The parts have merged into a whole. Each part was also a whole. A perfect beautiful whole. The pasture of my youth. The dark earth of plowed fields. The soft scent of manure drifts in the wind and mingles with scent of rain. The light of the muttering thunderstorm. Its flash of blueish white light touches my cheek. The lilac arched over the narrow road joins another lilac arched over forming a tunnel not either alone could form. The ancient rose bush blooms as if for the first time without any thought of the past that determines its form. The liquid dark color of the petal just opened the liquid green and fresh red of the bud suddenly exploded. The pure face of the child like lamb that loiter by the barn door are tilted gently asking toward me. Their dirty yellowish coats. Mud spattered above the hough on the thigh. They notice with interest my passing. In each ones innocent eye I see myself. They too are longing to be redeemed. In the enlightened bodhisatva all things merge and rest finding the end. The enlightened Self is perfect embracing all things and is the fulfillment of all longing. In me all things find rest in the Enlightened Self all things merge and become one.

The Road also a part of me. The journey of enlightenment is divine. The end reveals the beginning and the beginning foretells the end. The end reveals what was hidden in the clothes of desire. The pure heart that expressed itself in the intention becomes visible. What was hidden now can be seen. What lay dormant in potential becomes actual. Now I have eyes and can see it was all there at the beginning. What I sought was there all along dormant sleeping waiting ro arise with the first rays of this dawn of my self awakening after the great struggle of my coming to being.

 

Halves

Half of me

Is packed away

The other half

Lies scattered

 

Half of me

Is in the air

The other half

Is over there

 

Half of me

Can have no cure

As for the rest

It will endure

 

 

 

Thoughts on a World Series Game, 2016 (The Chicago Cubs vs the Cleveland Indians)

The wind that manifests itself to ear and eye

Along with the spirit it contains

Leaves the red leaf drier

And the dry tree yet more dry

Hollowed oak swung fast hits fly

The leather glove is meant to catch

And does so with a dive

Amid this changing more will change

Who but loses now must win again

The red leaves hustle the dry leaves race

The anchored ship the century –

All— turn upon a single point as fast

As the day in a moment felt

Rolling on its back like a seal

The heavy sea slides out pulling ashore

And heavily returns its concussive shock

But gently now upon a lonely shore

Opposing motions never stop— they just reciprocate

Like that which in the procreative act

Aches like an arrow for its scope

Each man to his field of play shot out

In unison as one from dug-out warm

Invigorating with their deeds the humid air

For this the struggle and this their care

Here the celestial sound of angry war has voice

Be it on earth or in a game a single atom or

Along the sunny shore where children play

That holy-smitten place where all of heaven’s heard

With it’s crashing just like water on the sea

Along the sand along the shore

Along the quiet strand that we adore

Where one must lose the other gains

For so it is and e’re must be

As now the Earth and now the Moon

Their tide and flood unleash

In quick catastrophe

A stolid housing coexists thru time

And does not move as objects do

New heroes are just not as great

As once their golden fathers

Invisible the hazard of the breeze

That draws this Life away

With like, yet fecund breath

The Spring allures and gratis all the world

The center of the game is round

Round as the ball that’s played

The sturdy house upon a sturdy base

Rests upon a sturdy plan that rests upon the same

We perceive the ceaseless action—and the change

The furious expedition of the Will

A steady candle burns away unstable flame

And fallen heroes rise again to battles new 

Compelled but not by fear of life to lose

But rather by which seeks no more

What can’t be found or is not had by all

 

How Far Away a Planet Shines

How far away

A planet shines

No broader than

My mind’s wide eye

It’s 3 o clock

And lunchers dine

So near the end of Time

They do not know

Just how it is

That what’s consumed

Must first be made

Each living thing

His portion guards

So as the sea

And all its wrath

Should be but loathe

To sweep away

And o’er the deck

Toward everlasting being

Rare it is

And hard to see

Man whose lot

Is only misery

He’s hauled ashore

And out of breath

In no more broken vessel

Than he who turned

Upon so cruel a sea

All faint and full of Sleep

Escaped and turned, I say

His back to see

His very soul

Both fugitive and free

The heart all pierced with fear

 

Who guards his life

Should keep his watch

Let no one sail for you

Who cannot list the time

Of Dawn just when

The deeper Trumpet blew

Let them not captains be

 

The ticket’s bought with currency

No earthly hand can touch

And fare is paid with such

We feel no more the need

Or any sense of urgency