I just watched a little video where they quoted the American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, he wrote of leaving footprints behind after your gone, footprints that will speak to others and lead them on in some way. I think that's a pretty good analogy for what I am trying to do with my photography. I want to create and leave behind something important, to not only live and disappear but to make something that says I existed and that will hopefully help people in positive ways. Maybe the viewer will think about something differently, maybe they will become emotionally moved in some new way, maybe they will become committed to a new cause or maybe there will be a raised awareness to an injustice. The photographs might leave their mark, they could continue to tell the stories of my subjects, they might speak long after I am gone like footprints in the sand and then I will have lived a life worth living.
At least thats my rather arrogant selfish goal, my hope, my dream!
:)) Happy New Year everyone!!
Here is the great original poem by Mr. Longfellow:
A Psalm of Life
At least thats my rather arrogant selfish goal, my hope, my dream!
:)) Happy New Year everyone!!
Here is the great original poem by Mr. Longfellow:
A Psalm of Life
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
What The Heart Of The Young Man Said To The Psalmist.
Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us farther than to-day.
Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.
In the world’s broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!
Trust no Future, howe’er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act,— act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o’erhead!
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.
