Category: Art
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What We Nurture in Art and Life Makes All the Difference
“I think of myself as a sort of farmer; I tend the rich soil of troubled children and nurture them as they grow, “ a social worker once said to me when I told her about my dreams of being a writer/farmer. At the time I had no idea that I would write novels about…
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By the Shores of Solon Pond (6)
“He who tills his own land has food in plenty, but he who follows idle pursuits is a fool.” Proverbs 12:11 Despite his whole-hearted belief in vegetarianism, Waldo’s father possessed not even the slightest hint of a green thumb. Each spring Joel Potter sent his sons to smooth the fields of stones. Piles stood like…
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By the Shores of Solon Pond (5)
Negotiating pay is tricky business for young farmer boy Waldo. His brother’s coughing woke him early. Coffee bubbled below and his father’s slightly burnt corn cakes gave off a sweet, acrid smell. The water in the washbasin was slightly reddened by a clot of his brother’s blood and a wave of yesterday’s worries flooded him…
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By the Shores of Solon Pond (4)
Waldo worries his uncle will find fault with him on the first day of work. Lucian bounded over the hill with his pair of overly enthusiastic yoked calves. One day, he would sell them and set aside the money for his own savings. Waldo envied him a moment until Lucian smiled and waved. “Waldo’s come,…
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The Annunciation by Mikhail Vasilevich Nesterov
My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for He has looked with favor on His humble servant. From this day all generations will call me blessed, the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is His Name. He has mercy on those who fear Him…
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Is it snowing where you are?
All the world that I see from my tower is draped in white and the flakes are coming down as big as pop-corns. It’s late afternoon – the sun is just setting (a cold yellow colour) behind some colder violet hills, and I am up in my window seat using the last light to write…
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The Portrait by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
This is her picture as she was: It seems a thing to wonder on, As though mine image in the glass Should tarry when myself am gone. I gaze until she seems to stir,— Until mine eyes almost aver That now, even now, the sweet lips part To breathe the words of the sweet heart:—…
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Lake George: The Queen of American Lakes
“Lake George is without comparison, the most beautiful water I ever saw; formed by a contour of mountains into a basin… finely interspersed with islands, its water limpid as crystal, and the mountain sides covered with rich groves… down to the water-edge: here and there precipices of rock to checker the scene and save it…
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Tolkien: Creating Middle-earth
On Creating Middle-earth: “We have come from God, and inevitably the myths woven by us, though they contain error, will also reflect a splintered fragment of the true light, the eternal truth that is with God. Indeed only by myth-making, only by becoming ‘sub-creator’ and inventing stories, can Man aspire to the state of perfection…
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Civil War Art
Boys without fathers … some heroic men come home broken or not at all. Some battlefields are revisited from one year to the next. Veterans tease new recruits on spring campaigns with the bones of men left to winter over in thick forests. “About 625,000 men died in the Civil War. That’s more Americans than…