Legend: Shaw, Mississippi
WILDFLOWERS
A melody emerges from the Mississippi Delta,
Holding some work songs, gospels and blues,
I feel like a morning star, Born Under a Bad Sign, I’ll Play the Blues for You, Praise His Name,
Flying swiftly from the white, brown and infinite flatlands,
Leland, Indianola, Ruleville, Sunflower, Drew, Parchman, Tutwiler, Vance, Lambert, Marks
Reaching the green round North central Mississippi hills,
Oxford, Taylor, Cotton Road, Bruce, Sabougla,
And taking its inspiration from the beauty of the everyday life,
Anna, Pat, Bill, Jackie and Clay.
Pieces of life, past and present, here and there, Wildflowers everywhere.
WILDFLOWERS is a photographic series made of two parts, reflecting each other through an ode to life: part 1. the Mississippi Delta and part 2. the North Mississippi Hills. Like a dust of metaphors and symbols, the images go with some lyrics, some texts or some poetry, making this series a beautiful common work: Anna Kline, William Ferris, Mark M. Clifton, Tony Rabalao, Howard Brown, and Matthew Shenoda are the authors as well as Paul Laurence Dunbar, Albert King, James “Son” Thomas, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Tennessee Williams and Herman Melville.
Legend: Richard road
So It Goes
Music and Lyrics Anna Kline
Six hundred acres of rollin’green
This dark, tilled earth is my only creed
Such a sight in front of me
Answers await the man who sews the seed
Crows feet smiling at the sun
The cookin’ and the cannin’
Have all been done
Blessed be to God above
Our harvest He made a prosperous one
Mule and bridle
Plow to dirt
These hands have seen no other work
Prayer and sweat
Coax a work of art
From the ground on up
So it goes
So it goes
So it goes
From head to heart
There’s a rattle down in my bones
I don’t mind the past
‘Long as it leaves me alone
Children hear my humble words
There’s more to life than what’s carved in stone
So it goes
So it goes
So it goes
From head to heart
Legend: Pat Thomas, bluesman, son of James “Son” Thomas, Leland.
“My friendship with James “Son” Thomas was my most important tie to the Mississippi Delta blues worlds that I documented in the 60s.Through my friendship with Mr Thomas, I discovered what I call the “blues family” in Leland, Mississippi. Each weekend this family gathered in the back room of Shelby “Poppa Jazz” Brown’s home in Kent’s Alley, where they danced to Mr Thomas’s music. I quickly learned that Mr Thomas was also a gifted storyteller and sculptor. His deep creative power was my window into the rich culture of the Mississippi Delta and its complex history of race, class and gender. James Thomas spoke to my students at Jackson State University, Yale University, and the University of Mississippi each year until his death in 1993. He taught them about the blues in deep, powerful ways. “
William Ferris
Legend: Fairview road
Summer in the South
Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906)
The oriole sings in the greening grove
As if he were half-way waiting,
The rosebuds peep from their hoods of green,
Timid and hesitating.
The rain comes down in a torrent sweep
And the nights smell warm and piney,
The garden thrives, but the tender shoots
Are the yellow-green and tiny.
Then a flash of sun on a waiting hill,
Streams laugh that erst were quiet,
The sky smiles down with a dazzling blue
And the woods run mad with riot.
Legend: Anna Kline at Highway 61 Blues Museum in Leland.
Tonight, Forever Yours
Music and Lyrics Anna Kline
Time it undresses
The fiction & wreckage
Of all to which we lay claim
More than a thief, well, I’d like to think
Time’s brought me more gifts than grief
Infinite numbers
Of lovers and others
Get caught in our web of desire
Want and need are two different things
Thank God for unanswered prayers
Pre-chorus:
We promenade
Through this great expanse
Spun round & round by some unseen hand
For all that I know, a presence unknown
Went to all this trouble for us
CHORUS:
Round the room of crossed up hearts
I’d like to believe
You’re the reason I’m seeing stars
Reason enough
My feet can’t feel the floor
Reason enough
Tonight, forever yours
Pushing us under
The current grew stronger
Downriver we washed ashore
Forged together with fire and hammer
Forever to change our course
When the dust settles
It does beg the question
Of how a love it will grow
There’ve been plenty of reasons for lovin’, for leavin’
You always were ever my home
Pre-chorus:
We promenade
Through this great expanse
Fortune’s the mistress of pure happenstance
Saddled and broke by all that I know
I find solace with one of my kind
CHORUS:
Round the room of crossed up hearts
I’d like to believe
You’re the reason I’m seeing stars
Reason enough
My feet can’t feel the floor
Reason enough
Tonight, forever yours
Legend: near Benoit
“When I think of the Mississippi Delta, I think of its large, expansive spread of rich, flat, farmland that reaches beyond the horizon, as far as the eye can see. Its trees and crops grow from fertile topsoil and are a lush, deep green. In the late afternoon, the sun sets the landscape on fire with rich red and deep yellow hues. The smell of the Delta is the smell of decaying leaves, of pools of water, of flowing streams that suggest life is being transformed before your very eyes. The sound of the Delta is that of birds, of barking dogs, and of automobiles approaching from afar, then passing, then receding into the horizon along Highway 61.”
William Ferris
Legend: smiling the Blues, Pat Thomas, Leland.
I’ll Play the Blues For You
Albert King (1923-1992)
If you’re down an’ out, an’ you feel real hurt
Come on over, to the place where I work
An’ all your loneliness, I’ll try to soothe
I’ll play the blues for you
(…)
Legend: broken mirror in an old gas station on 278 E near Marks
Casting Shadows
Mark M. Clifton
Reflections casting shadows on a Southern day
Reimagined by love sewn and spread across this flat land
Blissful mornings filled with clouds covering the ever-scorching sun
Protecting us all
Allowing the growth of so much more.
Legend: Anna
The poet and His song
Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906)
A song is but a little thing,
And yet what joy it is to sing!
In hours of toil it gives me zest,
And when at eve I long for rest;
When cows come home along the bars,
And in the fold I hear the bell,
As Night, the shepherd, herds his stars,
I sing my song, and all is well.
There are no ears to hear my lays,
No lips to lift a word of praise;
But still with faith unfaltering,
I live and laugh and love and sing.
What matters yon unheeding throng?
They cannot feel my spirit’s spell,
Since life is sweet and love is long,
I sing my song and all is well.
My days are never days of ease;
I till my ground and prune my trees.
When ripened gold is all the plain,
I put my sickle to the grain.
I labor hard and toil and sweat,
While others dream within the dell;
But even while my brow is wet,
I sing my song and all is well.
Sometimes the sun unkindly hot,
My garden makes a desert spot;
Sometimes a blight upon the tree
Takes all my fruit away from me;
And then with throes of bitter pain
Rebellious passions rise and swell;
But life– is more than fruit or grain,
And so I sing, and all is well.
Legend: the soil
Spirit
Mark M. Clifton
Rich in color, rich in touch, rich in ability,
Representing possibilities in an uncommon place,
Beauty sprouting from below
Essential in mind, but everlasting in spirit
So plentiful it is, so much it gives.
Legend: catfish ponds near Ruleville.
Moonlit Sky
Mark M. Clifton
As blue as a moonlit sky, these waters bring life,
A life so plentiful, so giving
A life filled with longevity
A life worth living.
Legend: Pat Thomas and Anna Kline at Highway 61 Blues Museum in Leland.
“The farm where I grew up in Mississippi was unique, in part because of its sheer beauty, and in part because of the amazing families – black and white – who lived there. My parents always taught us to respect all people regardless of their race, and I was intimately connected with black families on the farm from my earliest memories. Their voices, their music, and their faces are forever preserved in my memory as part of my extended family. My strong love for the blues was inspired by the musics I heard on the farm. In our home, Mary Gordon often sang hymns as she worked, and during Rose Hill Church services we could hear the congregation singing from our home. The sound of the congregation’s clear, beautiful a capella voices, had a powerful effect on me. When I attended Rose Hill Church with Mary Gordon, I felt immersed in the music in a way that forever shaped my love for black voice.”
William Ferris
Legend: the morning view
That Blessed Hope
Forest Leaves poetry collection
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (1825-1911)
(…)
Oh touch it not that hope so blest
Which cheers the fainting heart,
And points it to the coming rest
Where sorrow has no part.
Tear from heart each worldly prop,
Unbind each earthly string;
But to this blest and glorious hope,
Oh let my spirit cling.
Help me to love this blessed hope;
My heart’s a fragile thing;
Will you not nerve and bear it up
Around this hope to cling.
(…)
Legend: the door
Collecting Time
Music and lyrics Leh-Lo Tony Rabalao
We don’t have to win
We don’t have to lose
Cause we know how to play
And we don’t have to fight
And we don’t have to choose
But we can still have a say
Making contacts hard to keep
It’s a concept so hard to teach
We’ll just keep moving west,
collecting time
Save it up for never
Spend it all together
We’ll just keep on moving west,
collecting time
Today I’ll live for now
One day I’ll live forever
We don’t have to worry
But we do anyway
And we don’t have to care
But it’s built into the system
I guess it keeps us human
So we do it cause it’s there
Making contacts hard to keep
It’s a concept so hard to teach
We’ll just keep moving west,
collecting time
Save it up for never
Spend it all together
We’ll just keep on moving west,
collecting time
Today I’ll live for now
One day I’ll live forever
Saving it up for more than this
I ask myself if it’s worth the risk
Yes we may be moving
But this ride we’re on may be
all it ever is
Making contacts hard to keep
It’s a concept so hard to teach
We’ll just keep moving west,
collecting time
Save it up for never
Spend it all together
We’ll just keep on moving west,
collecting time
Today I’ll live for now
One day I’ll live forever
Legend: a heart of gold, Jackie
Songs for The People
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (1825-1911)
Let me make the songs for the people,
Songs for the old and young;
Songs to stir like a battle-cry
Wherever they are sung.
Not for the clashing of sabres,
For carnage nor for strife;
But songs to thrill the hearts of men
With more abundant life.
Let me make the songs for the weary,
Amid life’s fever and fret,
Till hearts shall relax their tension,
And careworn brows forget.
(…)
Our world so worn and weary,
Needs music, pure and strong,
To hush the jungle and discords
Of sorrow, pain and wrong.
Music to soothe all its sorrow,
Till war and crime shall cease;
And the hearts of men grown tender
Girdle the world with peace.
Legend: such a beautiful day
Wildflowers Grow, Even in The Dark
Mark M. Clifton
The light beams wide
Over this ever so wild landscape
Blissful moments consume me
This wonderful place, it groomed me
So far away from others, yet so near to my heart
A place where wildflowers grow, even in the dark
Legend: the light
“I wish that you were my sister. I’d teach you to have more confidence in yourself. The different people are not like other people, but being different is nothing to be ashamed of. Because other people are not such wonderful people. They’re one hundred times one thousand. You’re one times one! They walk all over the earth. You just stay here. They’re common as – weeds, but – you- well, you’re –Blue Roses!”
Tennessee Williams (The Glass Menagerie Act VII)
Legend: just a moment
An Inseparable Feeling
Mark M. Clifton
Passing the time
Thinking of you
Rocking away
An inseparable feeling
The moment, so high
The trees, hang low
If there’s another like this, I don’t want to know
Legend: the Queen, Honey.
Life
Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906)
A crust of bread and a corner to sleep in,
A minute to smile and an hour to weep in,
A pint of joy to a peck of trouble,
And never a laugh but the moans come double;
And that is life!
A crust and a corner that love makes precious,
With a smile to warm and the tears to refresh us;
And joy seems sweeter when cares come after,
And a moan is the finest of foils for laughter;
And that is life!
Legend: the secret garden
ART
Herman Melville (1819-1891)
In placid hours well-pleased we dream
Of many a brave unbodied scheme.
But form to lend, pulsed life create,
What unlike things must meet and mate:
A flame to melt – a wind to freeze;
Sad patience—joyous energies;
Humility—yet pride and scorn;
Instinct and study; love and hate;
Audacity—reverence. These must mate,
And fuse with Jacob’s mystic heart,
To wrestle with the angel—Art.
Legend: Bill, sculptor
(…) “When I do my sculpturing work, things just roll across my mind. If I see a picture in a magazine or on television, that’s what I’ll go by. I look at the picture to get the future of it better. The futures come in dreams. I lay down and dream about the sculpture, about how to fix one of the heads. I’m liable to dream anything. That gives you in your hand what to do. Then you wake up and try it. If you can’t hold it in your head, you can’t do it in your hand. (…) If I could get to a mountain where they have this clay like I use, I believe I could do me a whole man. I believe I could put a whole statue of a man standing up in that mountain. If the clay worked right, I could start at the head and come right down to the feets. I believe I could work a statue as big as a man. I believe I could make him just as tall as me or you, if I could get the right height dirt. That’s six foot high. I haven’t ever did it, but I believe I could.”(…)
James “Son” Thomas, bluesman and sculptor 1926-1993 (from Give my Poor Heart Ease by William Ferris page 118-119)
Legend: home
Staring Through The Window
Mark M. Clifton
Polar opposites alone
A polarizing symmetry together
Staring through the window
A window that is so grateful
Grateful to be a path
A path of navigation, in this hidden place
Legend: coming home
Twilight
Howard Brown
Day softens
in the failing
light.
The sky,
the Earth,
all that fills it.
Things blur
and begin
to murmur.
I sit, watch,
and wait
for darkness.
6-1-2013
Legend: Clay in the studio
Forget all Other Incarnations
Howard Brown
Forget all other incarnations, the
present reality is the one you
must live.
Behold the mountain, cloaked
in red, brown, green and gold.
For both you and the mountain,
there are four seasons: spring,
summer, fall and winter. And
while these seasons will pass
countless times for the mountain,
given the difference in velocity,
the same will not be true for you.
So, forget all other incarnations,
the present reality is the one
you must live.
9/16/2018
Legend: night owl
TRACES
“Traces” was originally published by the Academy of American Poets, Poem-a-Day. Copyright Matthew Shenoda.
In the hard shadow of the moon
when the recesses of light have gone
and the faint red of the hawk’s shoulder has disappeared from the
sky
in the growing pulse of the praying mantis
when the city has come into its own new light
it is here where I often remember:
the weaving of ocean vines
the trails of history, cemented by touch
the small ridged blossom of the cowry shell
the indigo dye made radiant by the seller’s basket.
The way the long grass
emerges at the shore.
Something of that meeting.
These are memories both distant and near
traces of them lived and felt
laughing in the company of the ones who came
holding the silence of the moment, as we stare
with wonder, at the bubbling ruptures of a painter’s canvas,
pull, with care, the clinging skin of a stubborn fruit.
I recall these moments
not from the grand gesture
of a thing once known,
but from a small place
the place where my child’s hand
is hidden warmly inside my own.
Carrying the Light
I want to thank from the bottom of my heart all the incredibly talented authors who contributed very generously to WILDFLOWERS and helped me make this photographic series, a special and unique one.
Anna Kline
William Ferris
Folklorist and photographer
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Give My Poor Heart Ease: Voices of the Mississippi Blues (https://uncpress.org/book/9781469628875/give-my-poor-heart-ease/); Les Voix du Mississippi (http://www.papaguede.fr/)
The Storied South: Voices of Writers and Artists ( https://uncpress.org/book/9781469607542/the-storied-south/)
The South in Color: A Visual Journal (https://uncpress.org/book/9781469629681/the-south-in-color/)
I Am A Man: Photographies et Luttes Pour Les Droits Civiques Dans Le Sud Des Etats-Unis, 1960-1970 (https://www.amazon.fr/Photographies-luttes-civiques-Etats-Unis-1960-1970/dp/2754114874/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1543245598&sr=8-1-fkmr1&keywords=i+am+a+man+photograpies+et+luttes+pour+les+doits+civiques+dans+le+sud+des+etats-unis%2C+1960-1970)
Pat Thomas, is the son of the legendary James “Son “ Thomas. He lives in Leland, Mississippi and you can find him every day at the Highway 61 Blues Museum.
You can find videos about Pat and about his father on Youtube and in films made by William Ferris. You can also find Albert King on Youtube.
Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906)
Paul Laurence Dunbar was one of the first African American poets to gain national recognition
Mark M. Clifton: Born and raised in the Mississippi Delta, Mark M. Clifton is an artist exploring the bounds of image and literature. Website: www.markmclifton.com
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (1825-1911)
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper was an African American poet, novelist and journalist. She was also a prominent abolitionist and women’s suffrage activist.
Leh-Lo Tony Rabalao is a sophisticated musician holding many strings to his bow: he is an internationally renowned drummer (Bedouin SoundClash, SATE, etc….), an amazing timeless songwriter and a soulful singer. You can find his music — Zig Zag 2007 and Lefty 2018 — on Spotify and Youtube.
Bill Beckwith http://www.williamnbeckwith.com
Howard Brown is a poet and writer who, in retirement, lives in Lookout Mountain, Tennessee. He grew up in the red clay hills of North Mississippi, earned his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Mississippi, practiced law in Jackson, Mississippi, Oakland, California and, more recently in Memphis, Tennessee. His poetry and short fiction have appeared in numerous print and online journals. In 2012, he published a collection of poetry entitled The Gossamer Nature of Random Things. In 2015, his poem “Pariah” placed first in the poetry division of Mississippi’s William Faulkner Literary Competition sponsored by the Tallahatchie Riverfest.
Clay Beckwith makes beautiful knives. You can follow him on Facebook SLAG Studios and Instagram @slag_studios
Matthew Shenoda: www.matthewshenoda.com
If you want to read more poems and know more about Paul Laurence Dunbar, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Herman Melville and Matthew Shenoda —look for www.poets.org
A story
I was born in France but raised in Maryland, from 2 to 5 years old. Since these vivid years, my American roots have called me back “home” at least once a year. That’s where I have forged a family, living in different places, cities and states in the USA. During my journeys, I spend most of the days on the road with my camera or together with my friends. These moments, these explorations, these deep feelings, always give birth to a new photographic series. WILDFLOWERS came out from my last October/ November 2019 trip.
Instagram @beatrice_chauvin
© Béatrice Chauvin 2019 Wildflowers
