The piece I have chosen to analyze is Gerrit Dou’s Dentist by Candlelight. A Dutch painter from the 1600’s, Dou began this piece that explores everyday life in 1660 and completed it in 1665. Painted with oil on oak panel (14x10 in.), the piece, which is mostly bathed in blacks and grays, has an eerie lure to it. Entrapped on the oak is a man with his mouth agape, sitting in a wooden chair, wearing a distinct look of anticipating agony. The man looks to the ceiling, where his eyes are met with an alligator hanging from the ceiling; the alligator’s mouth agape as well, with its underbelly aglow. The dentist holds a single candle to the man’s face with one hand, and with the other holds back the patient’s forehead. A concerned wife stands before the man, holding his hand, which is securely fastened to the arm of the chair. The viewer anticipates action, as the scene seems ready to unfold at any moment. The three people in this situation form a sort of circle through their lit facades and ...
Do you hear that? The whimpering breath of a dying dream It's more of a wheeze than a scream It's cracked open despair Pomegranate red drops of fresh squeezed blood Mixed with scalding hot tears The culmination of broken loss Life's timing forever tilted off My designs drawn in the sand Washed away with the rising tide Riding the knuckles of fate's fickle hand Plunged under the surface with aspirating aspirations The choked out gasps of fallen expectations Hope soaked and molding Resolve cracked and folding Slipping through my fingers like the finest grains of sand The shape and weight of those dreams like faded memories in starving hands
Each week, thousands tune in to watch the hit drama "The Blacklist" on NBC. And everyone who watches the show seems to have some theories about how Red Reddington and Elizabeth Keen are connected. What's interesting to note is that there is a whole community who ships (wants the romantic pairing of) Red and Lizzie. They even have a shipper name: Lizzington! At first I thought this notion was odd, because when the show first aired I had a sneaking suspicion that Red was Lizzie's father. But the more I watch the Blacklist, the less I am convinced of this. As a writer myself, it is always my goal to keep readers guessing. And when the show aired, nearly everyone thought that Red was her father. I think that is what the writers were aiming for, but with a show with as many twists and turns as the Blacklist, it'd be hard to believe that the writers would take such a predictable path. The episode last night really confirmed for me that he is not her father. ...
Shoot, great poem!
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