Rings of silver, white, gray and black jiggle in the lighted still-life water glass.
A splash of blue, a dash of yellow.
Track lighting from above pierces down through the water and off the sides of the glass.
Man delights not me, but certainly a glass of water on a black desk on a dark fall morning does.
A chapter of Moby Dick, where Stubb kills his whale.
There’s some red and blue ocean drama.
Blood meets passive sea.
Pink and purple blow hole spoutings – colors like the lees of wine – punctuate a struggle.
But these are fictions of a static kind.
Melville’s words on a page.
A still image of water in a glass – nothing engaging the character of me with risk and reward.
Nothing on the line for the “real” player in the play.
The real watcher in the drama.
The main character and the audience in one.
A red flag for sprinkler planning lays on the sidewalk, signifying nothing.
The dog chased quail out of the bushes on the trail.
Drama enough for the morning in calm land.
What kind of drama stirs the observer?
Happy kind,
Sad kind,
Rush kind,
Fear kind.
All kinds until the drama is noticed as imagined script.
Then it’s back to the calm land that’s true.