Fisher in Derwent Drawing pencils and metallic pen

This week;s Illustration Friday prompt is star. I went with stars, plural, because I'm a bit of a sky picture person.

Most of us in English-speaking North America and Europe know this constellation as The Big Dipper, The Plough, The Wain, or some variation. It's not a constellation at all, though. The Big Dipper is an asterism; a new picture made from a chunk of the bigger, actual constellation.

Scientifically, a constellation is a section of the night sky and all of the stars it contains. For most of us, though, when we think constellation we think of the imaginary picture our brains form by playing connect-the-dots with the stars in that part of the sky. Either way, this constellation is known as Ursa Major, the Big (or Great) Bear. The Graeco-Roman myth attached to it has to do with Callisto (or Callistro, sometimes), a nymph who was changed into a bear by Artemis (or sometimes Hera. Or sometimes Zeus. Mythology has a lot of sometimeses) for abandoning her vow of chastity and having a son named Arcas (sometimes Arctos...) with Zeus. There are many versions of what happened next. You can find my retelling of one of them on my other blog, here. Keep in mind that it's only one sometimes of many, however.

You'll notice that some versions explain the long tail of that bear by having it hauled up to the sky using the tail as a handle. Many cultures have seen Ursa Major as an animal (if you look up the constellation without my superimposed drawing, it looks like one), but not all of them see a bear. The Anishinaabe see a Fisher, a member of the weasel (mustelid) family. They have a wonderful story of how Fisher brought spring to the earth, and rather than embarrass myself by telling a story that really doesn't belong to me -- although I've done it before and likely will again -- I'd encourage everyone to read the story of How Fisher Visted Skyland.

Personally, I think it's important to look at the sky through different eyes, sometimes.

Phoenix in watercolour, pencil crayon, and metallic pen

Evolution
Out of the dusk a shadow,
     Then, a spark;
Out of the cloud a silence,
     Then, a lark;
Out of the heart a rapture,
     Then, a pain;
Out of the dead, cold ashes,
     Life again.
          - John Banister Tabb

Father Tabb and I certainly don't share a philosophy, but if you're not familiar with his poetry it's definitely worth a look.

This week's Illustration Friday prompt is spark, and frankly this was just me making a free-form mess while watching television last night. I have a tendency to be too literal when I'm doodling since a lot of it's for work and whatever plant or animal I'm working on has to look like that plant or animal. I figured I'd just wing this one, though, since no one really knows what a phoenix looks like anyway.

In the light of day this one looks more like it's wearing a black tutu than anything.



Yeah, you can't unsee that now, can you?

The paper I was using was far too thin to take watercolour, but I actually kind of like the way the wrinkles scanned. Sort of like rays of light and dark.

Lucky accidents are fun.

Midas Has... in soluble graphite

This week's Illustration Friday prompt is whisper. I seem to be stuck in mythology with IF entries lately, but what can ya do?

This one comes from Greek mythology again. Midas (yep, he of the golden touch) became a follower of Pan after accidentally turning his daughter to gold. At one point Pan challenged Apollo to a music contest. Apollo was judged to have won, but Midas fervently sided with Pan. Apollo scoffed that he must have ass's ears to think that, and gave him some as a punishment.

Midas was mortified and hid his ears under a turban so no one would know. He charged his wife (in some versions his barber, but I figured that I may as well stick with my series of inexplicably featureless females) never to tell a soul. The secret ate at her to the point where she nearly went mad, and in desperation she dug a hole and whispered the secret into it. Unfortunately for both her and Midas, reeds later grew on the soil covering the hole, and every time the wind blew over them they whispered Midas has ass's ears over the land.

Poor Midas never had much mythological luck.

As usual (so usual that I don't know why I bother to say it anymore), the scanner's done away with most of the wash. There's enough there to give the idea, though. Oh, and if anyone's wondering, this particular graphite is Derwent Graphitint. Limited colours, but at least it means that I'm not doing everything in greys when I'm doing the soluble graphite thing.

The scanner would probably love it if I'd stop doing the soluble graphite thing at all...

Tiamat in pen & ink and soluble graphite

This week's Illustration Friday prompt is storm.

Tiamat is... well, my knowledge of Babylonian mythology is sketchy at best, so I'll leave you to look her up for yourself this time. To be honest, I just wanted a sea goddess.

I don't know why I'm doing goddesses lately. I'm not usually a goddessy person.

The scanner killed this one as usual, but I was expecting it. Maybe I'll start signing my posted work "D.O. & Scanner". It's pretty much deserving a co-credit by this point. Anyway, please just do me the favour of assuming that there is actually a bit of sublteness (and shading, even) in the original. My co-creator apparently didn't think that it was necessary.

Just for fun I put this through a couple of quick filters after giving up on the hope of making the above look anything like the original. She kind of looks cool this way, really. Maybe I just should have posted this and called it digital art.

Ah well.

Daphne in various watercolour pencils

This week's Illustration Friday prompt is myth. Kind of my thing, what with the Classics courses in university and all of the sky mythology I do at work.

The scanner kind of killed this one, by the way, but I was expecting it to considering the medium. Or, I guess, media, since Inktense is technically ink and everything else was more standard watercolour. Anyway, I just decided to roll with it today. You can use your imagination if you'd like to guess at what the original really looks like.

The story of Daphne is easily findable on the internet, but the brief version is that Eros (Cupid) was annoyed with Apollo for saying that his arrows couldn't affect anything, so he shot Apollo with a gold-tipped arrow (leading to amorousness) and the naiad Daphne with a lead-tipped arrow (leading to abhorrence of love). Apollo chased, Daphne fled, and when it became obvious that she couldn't outrun the god she begged her father, the river god Peneus, to help her. He changed her into a laurel tree, and Apollo, still being in love, made the laurel his sacred symbol.

My Daphne looks nothing like a laurel, of course. Ah well. Artistic licence.

Corvus in inktense

This week's Illustration Friday prompt is vocal, and this... oh man, did the scanner do a number on this. I'm posting it anyway, but it looks a heckuva lot different in person, I can promise you. Just imagine actual washes and a lot less vague scribbling, if you don't mind.

The reason for this response to the prompt? The story (well, one of the stories. Thought I'd leave out the cheating pregnant lover version on this one. I hope no one minds) of the constellations Corvus (the crow), Crater (the cup), and Hydra (the water snake. And not the same hydra as the one that Heracles fought, for those who know that story. At least, not the same one as far as I know). Bear in mind as I retell it that this is the somewhat cleaned-up version I tell to kids when I'm doing planetarium shows. I'm not usually too much in favour of censoring mythology, but there's a time and a place for everything. Ready? Ok, here goes...

Apollo was the god of many things to the ancient Greeks, and among those things were the sun and music. In his job as the sun god, he had to pull the sun across the sky every day, which was a lonely task. As the god of music, though, he was able to gather many musical friends around him.

Amongst those friends was Corvus the crow (and yes, I usually do explain that Corvus means crow. It's the scientific name for them even today). Corvus was a gorgeous bird with beautiful, shimmery white feathers. He was very clever, and had the best singing voice around. When Corvus sang, even the gods on Olympus stopped to listen. With all of those virtues you'd think that things were fine for Corvus, but he had one big fault. He was lazy, and to get out of work he'd tell the most incredible lies. Not the best idea when you're hanging around with the gods.

Eventually the lies started to wear on Apollo, but in fairness he decided to give the bird one more chance before he banned him from his presence. He handed Corvus his golden cup Crater and told him to go down to a sacred spring on earth to fill it with water for him. Corvus took the cup and winged his way to the fountain, fully intending to make a good job of things to please the god. Unfortunately for him, though, he spotted something on his way that sent things in a different direction.

A fig tree.

Figs were Corvus's favourite food, and the closer he got to the tree the more he kept thinking of figs. By the time he got there, figs were the only thing on his mind, and he put the cup down in the grass and flew up to the tree intending to have a feast.

The figs, however, weren't ripe yet.

Well, by this time Corvus was so intent on figs that he decided to wait for them to ripen instead of just doing his job and coming back later. He waited and waited -- some say for days -- and even sang to the figs with his beautiful voice to help them ripen sweeter. Finally, the figs were ready. So Corvus ate a fig. And another fig. And another. He kept eating figs until he was pretty much full to the top with figs. And just like one of us after Christmas dinner, after such a meal he didn't feel like doing anything but napping. So he flew down to the ground, snuggled into the grass, and started snoring.

Apollo, meanwhile, had been watching all of this as he drove the sun chariot across the sky, and to say that he wasn't happy is an understatement. He shone the sun down in just such a way that it reflected off of the golden cup and straight into Corvus's eyes. Corvus woke with a start, wondering why everything was so bright, and noticed Crater lying there in the grass. Remembering his mission, he grabbed the cup, flew off to the spring as quickly as he could, filled the cup with water, and headed off back to Apollo's palace.

Now, things might have been fine if he'd just told the truth when he got there, but Corvus wasn't used to thinking that way. By the time he'd got back to Apollo, he'd thought of what he figured must be the perfect story to keep himself out of trouble for his laziness. He handed the god his cup, saying, "here's your water, Apollo, and I sure hope it was worth the struggle to get it."

"Struggle?" said the god. "I should have thought that filling a cup with water would be an easy enough job for a clever bird like you."

"Well, it would have been," replied Corvus," but when I got there the water was all murky, and I had to do my best to clean things up. Then I had to wait for the water to run clear. And then, just as I was going to dip your cup in, Hydra the Water Snake leaped out of the fountain, stole the cup from my beak, and swam back under the water. He's been living in your sacred spring, and that's why things were so dirty. Well, I couldn't let the situation continue, so even though I'm not a water bird like Cygnus the swan I jumped in, swam to the bottom, and fought the snake. It was tough, because he's big and very strong, but finally I was able to get my claws around his neck and squeeze until he was dead. Then I found your cup, waited until the water was clear again, and came back here as quickly as I could. So I hope you enjoy your water..."

Corvus could see that Apollo wasn't happy. In fact, Apollo was angrier than Corvus had ever seen him. Apollo was so angry that he reached out and grabbed the frightened bird by the neck. He put his hand down Corvus's throat and pulled out that beautiful singing voice, throwing it away to the wind (who uses it to make the tree leaves sing even today).

But Apollo wasn't finished. He started pulling out shimmery white feathers by the handful, letting them fall to earth where they became the first snow.

When Apollo was done, poor naked Corvus hid himself away in shame for a long time. He hid, in fact, until all of his feathers could grow back. When everyone saw Corvus with his new feathers, though, they were shocked. No more fine, shimmery feathers for that bird. The feathers grew back deep, deep black to remind Corvus of the dangers of black lies. And when it was time for music and Corvus went to sing, everyone covered their ears because there was no more beautiful singing voice to be had. No, all that was left was the Caw! Caw! that Corvus and all of his children have had to carry with them ever since.

Apollo later put Corvus, Crater, and Hydra up in the sky as stars. You'll notice, however, that Corvus can never quite reach the cup for a drink to soothe his poor raw throat...

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For anyone wanting a map to see the constellations for themselves, it's not hard for me to recommend Skymaps.com. Good, clear monthly PDFs with lots of added info. Don't go too closely by the plotting in my doodle -- I'll admit that I was mostly eyeballing it.

Incidentally, when I was trying in vain to fix the mess that the scanner made of the picture, I reversed it on a whim and I kind of like it that way. Gives you Corvus in his white form, if nothing else.

End of Day

End of day --
Hands jammed in pockets,
You and I shuffle through last year's soggy leaves
Searching for an opening.
Dead grass clumps beneath
And trees with skeleton hands claw their way up
Ghostly monochrome against the bruise-black sky.

This was once our time.
Back when the sleepy world turned to ice
Leaving lunatics and fools to bundle to the ears
And warm themselves by drawing silent pictures in the stars,
We owned this.
But spring's early warmth has hatched the party down the street,
The kids in the alley smoking something or other,
And the neighbour showing off his power with an obnoxious backyard floodlight.
Still, high above us
Orion shows his power in the heavens --
It's the same show, dear,
Just a different venue.

The noise disgusts you, I can tell --
You dig your feet in just a little deeper
As we stare out on those far-off lights
That our brains can't help turning into paintings.
I remember joining them --
The indistinct shapes pulling me along in the wandering,
The stories more real than anything on TV.
Now the skeleton trees demark my cage,
The bars which keep me from visiting the heights --
I'm chained to everyday...
You've broken my wings, my love,
But you don't know because you've never even flown.

"It's no use," you sigh,
"There's nothing here to see tonight."
Funny how the warmth has made the stars grow cold.
You trudge blindly back towards the house.
I stay, willing Polaris to point my way
For I am adrift on this ocean.
But stars are dead tonight,
And better sailors than I would be lost forever.

I see I needed winter chill to find us dancing in the sky --
New life has brought us to an ending,
And I shall mourn for you
Although you'll never notice I am gone.

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Um, yeah. A companion to this one, actually.

I'm completely incapable of leaving well enough alone when it comes to love poems. The cynic in me just won't allow it.

Life, the Universe, &...

Well past midnight in a cold November
We bundle up to stare at the skies
Stumbling out into the darkened yard
Two urban souls pretending country eyes

How many times I've tried to teach this show
Using all those stories there
To hide the things my eyes can't know
But tonight --
ah, tonight my world is waltzing through the glow
deliriously happy in the crackling air
The shapes come out like scattered Christmas snow
And I am being taught things older than old.

Above me reigns the vain Queen Cass
With weak-willed Cepheus as dull as he deserves
Nearby the dippers circle through forever
Divided only by old Draco's wand'ring line
(I think I find the dragon dim with shame
to be denied our axis once again
and see it granted to the Ursid's tail --
Too bad, my friend, you find our fickle earth
wobbling over to embrace its newer pole.
Oh well, we've never been that loyal...)

And now for Orion, that hunter bold
Placed in the sky by the grief of the moon.
And what in return for her gift?
Only the whining of a bored sportsman
in need of entertainment
(let's face it -- today the guy'd be glued to Monday Night Football).

And so we add the bull, the dogs, to keep the master fit
While Lepus shivers underneath in hopes he won't get bit.

Betelgeuse, Rigel, and the rest
Stars named by an Arab watcher in a time
When my kind forgot to think.
Strange to imagine a Dark Age
While such bright heralds still exist...

It's still too early for Sirius
although he's likely sparkling through the trees
And so I turn to Taurus.
The sky's so clear that even I can find the Pleiades.
"The Seven Sisters!" I exclaim.
You grunt, still busy fiddling with your toys --
you can't be bothered seeing something that will still be there.

And just like that I'm taken out of stories.
The sky is just the sky --
It's cold and big and dark.
The pictures made of suns so far away
the light was born too long before we met.
I stare and stare
but all that reaches out is space.

Then, "come see," you wave
and reluctantly I head toward that lens
the thing you've pointed at a light I couldn't place.
I look and, to my shock, as clear as hope
A circled disc appears to dance before my face.
"Saturn. It's really there," I whisper, "and so close..."
You ask if I can see division in the rings -- and I --
I say I just can't find division here tonight.
I feel your grin as you take up my hand
Encircled so much warmer than that world.
We stand in stars together, you and I
And once again I tell you of the sky.

----------

This was written quite a long time ago, and the feelings it describes are much older than that. It's very uneven, but it's interesting to me to see how my style's changed since then. According to my notes I was purposefully alternating more poetic rhymes with free verse to give the impression of alternating between being swept up in the wonders of sky mythology and being brought back to earth. Erm, so to speak. I'm not sure now that it works, but you've got to give points for the effort.

The man in the poem? Someone I dated. Ages ago. No idea where he even is now. He was convenient for the poem, though, because when we'd go out to look at the sky together he really would be fooling around with some toy or other. I always thought he was missing the best part of the show, but to each his own.

One other thing: in case you couldn't tell from this very wordy poem, I'm extremely nearsighted. That'll explain some of what's in there.

Luna

Old man
With half a face
Blinding out the Hyades

Old boat
Encrusted with barnacles
Pulling in its wake
Lunatics and women

You are goddess, chariot,
Artemis leading the wild hunt --
Basking in a brother's mirrored glory
Forever

Does my blood reach out to you
Like the waters of the world?
Dead, stepped-on rock
Holding our litter and our past
Frozen in stone

I know you, Queen of Wanderers --
Just a satellite
Cold companion to a marble
Wearing a stolen halo
And giving your aid to common thieves

Yet -- I dance with you
Your moods flow through me
And in the fullness of your chill grey glare
I will howl

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This one was written back in 2001, and I'm starting with it partly because it's short (back then I was writing a lot of long, wordy rambles) and partly because I can still stand it.

I usually cringe when I look back at my old poems.

It's a pretty basic meditation on the moon and its various aspects: male/female, mystic/prosaic; that sort of thing. The moon's been looked at in many ways over its history (or should I say over human history. I have no idea whether the dinosaurs even noticed the moon), and while it's lost some of its mystery since we've been up there and walked on it (if you believe the moon landings really happened... and yes, I do) it's interesting to me that on a clear night it can still make me wish it had some of that mythological power back.