Stillness Seeking :: Personal Narrative Photographer Essays

Stillness Seeking Onto the terracotta patio I step mutelyPast lavender climbing twisting vinesThe honey drops sunlight sprinkled halcyonMy mother a paintbrush in her handShe touches color to canvas deli spewe yellow orange, lightEmergesMy father beyond resting seatedA cat slumbers purrs on his shoulderA pen in his hand he touches white pageReflects light reflectsTogetherCreating When I saw Vermeers fille with a Pearl Earring about five years ago at the National Gallery in Washington, D.C., I felt something about the photo that I had never felt before when looking at artwork. I felt as if this girl, this young woman in the painting was real, screen in the museum behind this canvas. She was in the flesh. Her skin was still dewy from tether hundred-something years ago, the light crossways her face still glowing. She was in the round, her eye followed mine, she was real. She was about to speak, she was in a moment of thought, she was in reflection. This girl was non crimson red or titanium white, she was flesh. Vermeer caught her, a butterfly in his hand. She was not just recorded on canvas, she was created on canvas. She was caught in a moment of stillness. Vermeer creates moments in his paintings. When viewing them, we step into a private, intimate setting, a story. Always, everything is quiet and calm. I realize now it is no wonder I had such a strong reaction to Vermeer the first time I saw him he is a stillness seeker. This morning I wash early from the light that creeps underneath my blinds and my bed next to the window. I catch fire floating on the streams of light, heated, like white wax spilled across the floor, dripping, soft. In bare feet I walk down the stairs, cold on the wood, and find my father in the kitchen, also awake early. Together, we leave the rest home, the house that my parents built with windows like walls, windows that show the water on either side of the island. We close the door quietly so as not to wake the sleepers. We walk down the pine-needle path, through the arch of trees, the steep wooden step to the dock nestled in the sea-weed covered rocks. We sit silently on the bench, watch as the fog evaporates from the clear water. The trees and water are a painting in muted colors, silver and grays and greenish blue, hazy white above the trees.