Parallel Inspiration, Part 4
It sometimes happens, that though we might not be directly inspired by another work of art, we can be inspired by similar idea or parallel inspiration and see perceptions reflected back to us in a totally different medium.
Not long ago, I went to a Strathmore Gallery Show because my sister, the artist, Rosemary Fallon, had a photograph in it. The theme of the show was Night. When I saw Rosemary’s photograph, of layers of light in water and sky in the minute or so before daylight has dissolved into night, a poem I had written, titled, The Violet End, immediately rose up my mind. No, neither work of art directly inspired the other, but what I felt was the powerful parallel between them, which was particularly striking since the artist was my own sister. I felt very connected to Rosemary’s photograph, as if I somehow shared in the vision that had produced it. It fascinates me that we were both moved to make a work of art out of the same moody transformations of light and color that take place at twilight.
Maine Evening Light by Rosemary Fallon
The Violet End
The sky comes slowly down.
The color of the air—
A blue-violet—deepens.
The yellow windows shine
Through the black branches.
All along the sidewalks,
Beneath the streetlamps
The purples are transparent still,
As waves are beneath the sea,
Clear as the light that
Slides down the rainbow,
Spectrum of the visible, until
The violet ends.
Night comes.
What a privilege it is to see through someone else’s eyes so that we imagine and live more fully! After all, it is inspiration-- the beautiful and meaningful-- that sustains us.