diagrams

 

Dear Drawing,

Ooh, I love these diagrams!  I found them in a book of paintings of birds, and they are really wonderful.  They are more compelling than the actual paintings, but I give you a few of them, so you can see for yourself.  I love the compositions of the shapes, untethered from their landscape.  If you are crazy curious about the books, you can see one here, and the other, there.

The whole thing has got me thinking about the outlines, the minimum that you need to tell the tale of identity, and I am also considering the circled numbers; the corresponding text.  Is that the compelling part?  Is the appeal the way this diagram hopes to instruct?  When we see a diagram, do we get ready to receive direction?

What if, say, I took a whole lot of outlines, of things, like leaves, cups, pillows, fruit; and I put some numbers on, or near, and I painted it all up in a nice buttercup color?  That sounds like it would be swell, doesn't it?  The outlines would have maybe the barest hint of reference to them, just enough to make you think, and then we can enjoy contemplating the question posed by having these varied objects in the same picture.  

Écoute bien.

Dear Poetry-Lovers,

This wonderful poem comes to me from the far and wide ranging tentacles of the Dodo correspondents.  To think that I have been bumbling along in the dark without this lovely poem for so long gives me a twinge of regret.  However, we have committed ourselves to looking forward, and so on we go with this Jacques Prévert poem in hand; the original French follows the Ferlinghetti translation.





To Paint the Portrait of a Bird

                                                       To Elsa Enriquez

First paint a cage
with an open door
then paint
something pretty
something simple
something beautiful
something useful
for the bird
then place the canvas against a tree
in a garden
in a wood
or in a forest
hide behind the tree
without speaking
without moving...
Sometimes the bird comes quickly
but he can just as well spend long years
before deciding
Don't get discouraged
wait
wait years if necessary
the swiftness or slowness of the coming
of the bird having no rapport
with the success of the picture
When the bird comes
if he comes
observe the most profound silence
wait till the bird enters the cage
and when he has entered
gently close the door with a brush
then
paint out all the bars one by one
taking care not to touch any of the feathers of the bird
Then paint the portrait of the tree
choosing the most beautiful of its branches
for the bird
paint also the green foliage and the wind's freshness
the dust of the sun
and the noise of insects in the summer heat
and then wait for the bird to decide to sing
If the bird doesn't sing
it's a bad sign
a sign that the painting is bad
but if he sings it's a good sign
a sign that you can sign
so then so very gently you pull out
one of the feathers of the bird
and you write your name in a corner of the picture.

(translated by Lawrence Ferlinghetti)

 From Paroles, by Jacques Prévert


Pour Faire Le Portrait D'un Oiseau

                                                               A Elsa Henriquez

Peindre d'abord une cage
avec une porte ouverte
peindre ensuite
quelque chose de joli
quelque chose de simple
quelque chose de beau
quelque chose d'utile
pour l'oiseau
placer ensuite la toile contre un arbre
dans un jardin
dans un bois
ou dans une forêt
se cacher derrière l'arbre
sans rien dire
sans bouger...
Parfois l'oiseau arrive vite
mais il peut aussi bien mettre de longues années
avant de se décider
Ne pas se décourager
attendre
attendre s'il le faut pendant des années
la vitesse ou la lenteur de l'arrivée de l'oiseau
n'ayant aucun rapport
avec la réussite du tableau
Quand l'oiseau arrive
s'il arrive
observer le plus profond silence
attendre que l'oiseau entre dans la cage
et quand il est entré
fermer doucement la porte avec le pinceau
puis
effacer un à un tous les barreaux
en ayant soin de ne toucher aucune des plumes de l'oiseau
Faire ensuite le portrait de l'arbre
en choisissant la plus belle de ses branches
pour l'oiseau
peindre aussi le vert feuillage et la fraîcheur du vent
la poussière du soleil
et le bruit des bêtes de l'herbe dans la chaleur de l'été
et puis attendre que l'oiseau se décide à chanter
Si l'oiseau ne chante pas
c'est mauvais signe
Signe que le tableau est mauvais
mais s'il chante c'est bon signe
signe que vous pouvez signer
Alors vous arrachez tout doucement
une des plumes de l'oiseau
et vous écrivez votre nom dans un coin du tableau.


 



If all this puts you in the mood for French, try this Serge Gainsbourg song to Jacques Prévert.

The Birds.

Dear Looking Out the Window,

Oh my!  They are everywhere right now- the Raven is talking to himself in the window of the barn to the North, the finches are moving in a tight flock of chirping, the shrubs send up cyclones of sparrows when I walk out the door.  There are bluebirds in the bath, and towhees, flickers, doves, thrashers, and wrens scuffling on the ground. 

When you begin to watch birds, as a verb, a hobby, to birdwatch; at first it is all leaves and splitseconds.  The feathers are indistinguishable from the foliage, and if you are lucky enough to spot something moving, it’s like a flashbulb and there isn’t time to recognize anything more than that it might have been a bird?  As you put in your hours, though, forms begin to emerge from the leaves- after awhile, you have a sense of bird and non-bird, and gradually, there is enough time to see some things that approach details: brownish, a forked tail, a roundness, a long pointed beak.  Eventually, you can glimpse but a shadow and know that it was an oak titmouse.  You also become attuned to the sounds of the different birds; even the sounds of the wingbeats.  In fact, after a long while at it, you can become quite amazed at the variety of details that you are able to identify.  Things that in the early days you never dreamed you could notice- things like the rising and falling arc that certain birds make in flight.  Or, the sound of some birds’ feet, as they scuffle around in the leaf litter.  It’s all very distinctive, it turns out.

The time of counting for Project Feederwatch is very soon, and I hope this year you will sign on and make a regular appointment with your backyard birds.  The practice of looking is very rewarding.

Rachis

Dear Birders,

Here's one for your life list, to which you must now add all of the prehistoric birds formerly known as dinosaurs.  We are going to need a bigger field guide, my friends!

a little bird told me

Dear Trying,

Today I take a lesson from the birds, specifically the flight of a bird- the White Breasted Nuthatch.  The nuthatch would easily be as featured on calendars and greeting cards as the chickadees had they such a lyrical and onomatopoeic name.   

It flies thus: first, a slight dive, a little dip, then it flaps forcefully, swiftly, into an upward climb,  reaches a point (who knows where this point is?) and then descends, falls, actually, in a graceful slope.  Then, up it flaps again.  Lots of birds fly like this - I am still observing just how many birds, give me another 20 years and I will give you a more complete list.

The message, I thought, from my porch on my skates, was to ascend and fall; not as you might have thought, to fly, so much as to dive, jump, leap up, and then fall in a bell curve.  Yes.  Flying is not so hard, but falling might be....

This led me to consider how small is small.  Just what is small?  How big are the details that the devil is in and we are not to sweat?  For me to do anything at all, I have often had to push hard against the awareness of details.   Details impinge ceaselessly.  I just don't seem to be able to get off the ground with them. 

Reflecting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Too Cute?

Dear Bird Voyeurs,

Submitted for your approval, or disapproval:

 

 

 

 

 

Nest Box Cam season approaches, and I am still not sure what I think of it all, but I spend a few hours every other week counting and watching the birds at the feeders for Project Feederwatch.  How far am I from playing dress up with my feathered friends, I wonder?  Am I a deontologist or a consequentialist?

 

More about Piip Show.  More about Feederwatch.  More about surveillance ethics.  If you read the entire article, you can reward (?) yourself with a look at this bit of film, and further contemplate our insatiable appetite for entertainment and knowledge.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Charting the Wings.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dear Birders and the Cartographically Inclined,

 

The map is such a beautiful metaphor for time and our journey through it, and it puts us in a position of viewing the larger picture- it pushes us back out, and lets us be but a small stitch in the enormous tapestry.  This, as you know, is why maps show up here regular-like, on the Dodo.  Please enjoy this animated map showing you where your birds have been and where they are going.

 

May the wind be at your back.