This is one of the black & white nature photo of an old
and weathered tree by Barry Massoni entitled, "From Hell's Heart." |
This is the second Moby Dick inspired photo I've taken recently.
"Inspiration" may be the wrong word, at least with relation to Melville.
At the time, while hiking on Mt. Diablo's North slope near Wild Oat Canyon,
I was inspired by the wood formation of a tree, which was amazingly enough still
standing. Upon processing the film I noticed what appeared to be a scarred white
whale breaching. It takes a bit more imagination to see an equally warped Ahab
on the left, arm raised to strike, paused in soliloquy- "Towards thee I roll,
thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; to the last I grapple with thee;
from hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee-"
causing both whale and many a glassy eyed high school student to mutter, "Just
throw the damn harpoon already." (Sorry, Herman.) Again, giving my own interpretation
goes against my policy of letting nature define itself, and leaving
beauty to the eye of the beholder- but they're my rules, so I can break them. |