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Pink is not my favorite color, but this July pink flowers kept catching my attention, as did blooms in white,

and in gold.

I love photographing trees reflected in water. But sometimes I was so focused on shooting such images, that I nearly missed the ducks for the trees, like these little fellows sitting silently in the bottom of my frame.

Spiders — yes, spiders! — continued to woo me with their wondrous webs. As imperfect as they are, I cannot help but share these images of spider webs I saw one July night in Maine. Layers upon layers of fog-covered webs illuminated by night lights.

Guest contributors added visual and culinary spice to our lives by sharing recipes and photographs. Links below will take you to recent posts. Expect many more tasty selections in the coming months.

Tell Me About the Petunia Wall

Sunflowers

And what does August hold? Hmmm.

* New submissions to writing and photography contests, magazines and other Call for Artists.

* Putting better business practices into place around my creative life, from fun stuff like new business cards to better systems for cataloging and tracking images and articles.

* Following up on recent opportunities to tell other peoples’ amazing life stories.

* Pulling together all my camera gear and giving everything a good cleaning!

* Writing. Writing. Writing.

Sunflowers!

Ah! Sunflower

Ah, Sunflower! weary of time,

Who countest the steps of the Sun,

Seeking after that sweet golden clime

Where the traveller’s journey is done:

Where the Youth pined away with desire,

And the pale Virgin shrouded in snow

Arise from their graves, and aspire

Where my Sunflower wishes to go.

Words by William Blake

Image by Lorraine

The Scenic Charles

It has been a while since I walked along the Charles River with my camera.  Just a short trip today after work, and this is what I saw.

Like the sun …

Ingredients

6 medium strawberries

1/2 teaspoon of sugar, plus extra pinch

splash of red wine

1 tablespoon lemon and/or lime basil leaves, chopped

Hull strawberries.  Slice in half.  Place in medium sized bowl.  Add 1/2 teaspoon of sugar and splash of red wine.  Gently toss until strawberries are well covered.  Place in shallow bowl or in center of a plate.  Sprinkle with basil leaves and the pinch of additional sugar.  Enjoy morning, noon or night.

Recipe and images by Cynthia Staples.

Collect My Moo Cards

Six cards, six images.  I’ve been  having a lot of fun with Moo, producing unique and collectible business cards to promote my writing and photography. Below is Set 1.  Would you like to collect these six images taken in and around Boston?  I’ll drop a set in the mail to you, no charge, so long as supplies last.  Just email me at photographybycynthia[at]gmail.com.

One of my favorite phrases from childhood is “tell me a story.”  Four words that were an invitation to weave together the day’s events into a narrative with a beginning, middle and an end.  Well, on this quiet Monday (at least where I am), I invite you to tell me a story using the following image recently sent to me by a friend.  It is a petunia growing straight out of a wall.  If you know nothing of petunias, let me tell you, it takes a while for them to grow from seed into a flowering plant.  How did it get there?  As it grew, did people stop to stare?  As the blossom formed, was anyone tempted to pick it?  How in the world has it survived the recent summer storms?  Hardy little thing it surely is.

The Petunia Wall by Frank Reece

I received an e-update today from poets.org that included news about W. S. Merwin, one of my favorite poets. He is succeeding Kay Ryan as the 2010-2011 U.S. Poet Laureate.  His is a poetry that makes one pause.  Maybe all poetry does that. 😉  In any case, in the bookstore where I work, in the quiet moments, I pull Merwin’s Shadow of Sirius from the shelf.  I recently discovered that he’d written a famous poem about mushrooms. As someone who has habitually avoided mushrooms I am amazed at how often mushrooms are appearing in my life this summer!

Looking for Mushrooms at Sunrise

When it is not yet day
I am walking on centuries of dead chestnut leaves
In a place without grief
Though the oriole
Out of another life warns me
That I am awake

In the dark while the rain fell
The gold chanterelles pushed through a sleep that was not mine
Waking me
So that I came up the mountain to find them

Where they appear it seems I have been before
I recognize their haunts as though remembering
Another life

Where else am I walking even now
Looking for me

— W. S. Merwin

Stormy Weather

Dead Mule School of Southern Literature has posted a poem that I wrote about southern storms.  Thanks to the folks at Dead Mule.  You can check out my poem at the link below, and please do read some of the other wonderful poems, essays and stories you’ll find on the website.

Summer Storms –  Poem

And to learn more about how a southern upbringing influences this creative life, read the recent interview with Molly Anderson-Childers for Creativity Portal.com.

Isabel is my landlady.  In her garden there are flowers and vegetables and herbs of all sorts and whimsical little touches for her daughter like little white birds.  And there is Oswald.  Oswald is a rat.  When I’ve stood in the garden, I’ve seen him dash by behind me.  And when I sit upstairs in the kitchen window, I see him nibbling on plump leaves below.  He’s a city rat, big, brown and long-tailed and whiskered.  His coat is streaked with gray.  Perhaps he’s old and has lived in the garden a long time.  It is a very nice garden.

I’ll be honest.  I do not have a fondness for rats.  But I do love nature.  Oswald is a part of the garden’s ecosystem.  So, when I see him and my heart hammers and I just want him GONE, I try to think of rats I’ve liked in literature, like those in Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH.  Then there’s that pot bellied rat in Charlotte’s Web.  I’m sure there are others.  In any case … I’m hoping we can find a way to live together.