Tag Archives: nature

Botswana Beauties: Baby

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too young yet to savage his own feed
before puberty promotes him to 
that other list of african fives
with the vulture the warthog 
the gnu and the marabou
perhaps it's not a face
that only a mother would love
A photograph of a young hyena pup partially obscured by tall, dry grass in Botswana. The pup is looking directly at the camera with a cautious yet curious expression. The image challenges the common perception of hyenas as ugly, visually representing the post's title, 'Botswana Beauties: Baby'.

Botswana Beauties: Gwyneth

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red-billed oxpeckers love their
gwyneths long-legged and graceful
she gets the daily exfoliation at five
they get some nesting overnight
but not before she slides in
a sundowner at the corner watering hole

A beautiful photograph of a tall giraffe standing gracefully in a sunlit field in Botswana. A small oxpecker is perched on its neck, a detail that visually represents the theme of 'daily exfoliation' mentioned in the post. The symbiotic relationship between giraffes and oxpeckers is a classic example of mutualism. Oxpeckers, small birds, feed on ticks and parasites found on the giraffe's skin, providing the giraffe with pest control. In return, the oxpeckers get a readily available food source. This relationship benefits both species.

A humorous and intimate photograph of a giraffe with its front legs splayed and neck bent low to drink from a waterhole. The giraffe's reflection is perfectly captured in the water, creating a symmetrical image that contrasts its usual graceful posture with a moment of comical awkwardness.

Bhutan Series: Ngawang/Thimpu

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A tranquil photograph of a wooded hillside in Thimphu, Bhutan, with hundreds of colorful Buddhist prayer flags strung between tall, slender trees.

Ngawang fast walks 20 clicks before breakfast
returns in time to guide a stroll of guests
he’s been a monk a soldier
an 8-times snowman trekker
these days chasing the tariffs
to send his 3 girls to school
working for milk toast money

past the peak he pulls away
giving me space to descend the valley alone
there in the flurry of prayer flags
an orange butterfly leads me down

eden project # 4: stalking

Image

A close-up photograph of the slender stalk and delicate white flowers of a plant, likely Cow Parsley, with a tiny red ladybug climbing the stem. The image was taken at the Eden Project in the UK.

eden project #3: tissue

Image

A close-up photograph of a white Rockrose flower, with five delicate, paper-like petals and a dark, star-shaped center. The image was taken at the Eden Project in the UK.

standley’s chasm

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A vertical photograph looking up from the floor of Standley Chasm, also known as Angkerle Atwatye, in the Northern Territory of Australia. Two towering, reddish-orange rock walls rise steeply on either side, their vertical textures emphasized by the narrow strip of bright daylight that enters from above. The light powerfully illuminates the sandy ground at the base of the chasm and the top of the rock faces, while the rest of the walls are cast in deep shadow. The image conveys a dramatic sense of scale and enclosure within this significant geological feature of Central Australia.

Ms. Ida Standley 
flinty with resolve
first schooled
the mulatto castoffs in Alice
till the attentions of leery townsmen
dogging her female charges 
drove her bulwark westward
to Ray's Creek 
near the chasm  
the namby magma stretchmark
once extruded through quartzite
worn now down to naught
great Australian orogeny
and misogyny alike
bowing to force of nature
leaving the base cleft

The Trunk Series (No. 5) — Chocolate Curl

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A close-up photograph of the trunk of a Marri tree, also known as a Red Gum. The image highlights a long, dark strip of bark that has peeled away from the smooth trunk, curling outward in a shape and color that perfectly matches the post's title, 'Chocolate Curl'.

Cape to Cape Walk; Day 6

Consumption

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The lesson from history and nature is

adapt and survive

It is roots in rock

eking spare moisture
from minute fissures in time
to pry the jagged jaws
too thirsty yet to ever stand
closer than several cracks apart

It is fleshy welwitschia

named mirabilis
reputed to live
two full millennia
with just two leaves and
elephants about to shred them for dinner

The lesson from history and nature is

to love the feast
to love it fully
to await it humbly
to expect it
never

Palmweg Concession, Namibia

December 2013

first published on salt.org.sg

natural monochrome

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nature requires

no touch-up

no filter

iso 200

sooc

raw

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