Vision & Creation

2025 was my sixth year of taking daily photographs. My photography and poetry come together as I observe the world around me. It is a personal and contemplative practice of notice and it opens “a doorway to a new world,” as John Muir once expressed. From my knees in the woods or crouching in suburban gardens, or as close as I can get to tree branches, pond surfaces, the moon, I frame and click on the tiny, the mystifying, the natural creation of beauty as it is.

BEGINNINGS

In January 2020, I began photographing nature to create a daily post on Instagram. I paired images with poem lines because I had begun to deeply love poetry. It was an experiment to try and unite the ephemeral and temporary aesthetic of nature and poetry in one post, and it was a meditation of sorts after experiencing loss. Under the isolation of the pandemic that followed, the endeavor was life changing.

I saw the resilience and sensuality of flowers moving from bud to bloom, the restorative precipitation of rain and snow on petals, leaves, grasses, earth, and I saw nature’s exhales of mists and fogs over sports fields and suburban streets—fascinating and gorgeous—and from which sometimes stepped a family of deer like in a dream. Other days, I met pollinators fliting about and other creatures staring out from their realms: monarchs and small whites, bluet dragonflies, milkweed beetles, spotted lanternflies, gray squirrels, cardinals and blue jays, loud blackbirds, bullfrogs and peepers. In these observances, I heard the words of poets and became inspired.

Every day the weather modifies the flow of seen and unseen. My attention is drawn by light, wetness, new buds, new color, the wind, the battle for power, death. In a way, feeling sight.

PHOTOS

Of the more than 2,000 photos I’ve taken on my daily outings, the ones here offer a range of season, texture, color, and life. New ones will be added. Some will be selected to publish in a forthcoming book. All of them are taken with my phone camera.

You can find others and new photo posts on Instagram: @poemrunnerink