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reaching for the sky just to surrender
For reasons that I don’t understand, Leonard Cohen’s music became my personal soundtrack while I was on the dunes. I don’t mean that I was listening to the music through my phone. I mean that bits of his lyrics would appear in my brain from time to time, unbidden yet still welcome.
In this case, I heard the line “reaching for the sky just to surrender.” This yucca will lose its battle with the movement of the sand, as have the ones that were there before and the ones that will come after. All of them reach for the sky for a time before their inevitable acquiesce. It’s the way of things.
White Sands National Park, New Mexico
photographed 12.13.2025
a lullaby for suffering
Lately I’ve been re-listening to Leonard Cohen…
When I look at this scene, I am unable to decide if the sand is encroaching on the branches and will eventually cover them, or if the branches spend their time escaping the sand and will eventually join their colleagues on the next dune over.
The more I look, the more uncertain I am.
But what does this have to do with Leonard Cohen? Nothing, probably, except that my mind connects photographic confusion and his lyric:
There’s a lullaby for suffering
And a paradox to blame
But it’s written in the scriptures
And it’s not some idle claim
You want it darker, we kill the flame
Paradox. Darker. Flame. Suffering.
White Sands National Park, New Mexico
photographed 12.14.2025
forget your perfect offering
Inside a tiny church in the midst of a huge desert…my mind wandered and then the words “forget your perfect offering” came to me as I was making this image.
It’s a line from the Leonard Cohen song “Anthem” – and here’s some of the rest of the song.
Ah, the wars they will be fought againThe holy dove, she will be caught againBought and sold, and bought againThe dove is never freeRing the bells that still can ringForget your perfect offeringThere is a crack, a crack in everythingThat’s how the light gets inWe asked for signsThe signs were sentThe birth betrayedThe marriage spentYeah, and the widowhoodOf every governmentSigns for all to see
The song is more profound now than it was when he wrote it – give it a listen.
Calera Chapel
near Toyahvale, Texas
photographed 2.18.2025
One Day | One Image 