Statue, Esq.

autumn sunlight falls
as once a discus soared
then returned to earth

The changing seasons can be readily observed by watching static objects. What effect does the different light have on them? How do the colors around them change their appearance? How well do they fit into their surroundings? 

The one-armed discus thrower probably never thought he would be overseeing the feeding of the ducks by the reflecting pool in front of the opera house, but it doesn't seem to bother him much. At least I've never heard him complain.

this angel’s not stone
but a miracle waiting
to happen to you

One day last fall, I got off the streetcar at the Bergfriedhof on my way home from work and walked around there for the first time since I moved to Stuttgart in 2002. I had my new Panasonic Lumix DZ38 with me and was snapping around me left and right when the cemetery gardener slowly approached me and asked if I was looking for anything in particular. What ensued was perhaps the nicest spontaneous conversation I've had with a stranger since I've been in Germany. He told me about how he was the third generation in his family to look after that cemetery. I opened up and asked him questions about the graveyard, burials in Germany and renting a grave (in Germany you usually rent a grave for 20-30 years, then it is re-used after the coffin has decomposed). I believe he pointed out this little angel to me. 

This grave girl reminds me of the little mermaid in Copenhagen except that this statue is clothed. I love the colors that emerge from the different textures of bronze as the light falls on the metallic finish.

wet-maned lions’ roar
resounds across the plaza –
frozen statues stare

Finally, we move away from the cemetery and head back into the center of Stuttgart, where the regal lions guard the fountains at the Schlossplatz. Every camera-toting tourist who has ever been to the Swabian capital has taken a picture here, but what I liked about this shot is the dominant contrasting colors of blue and yellow and the - albeit static - interplay between the gaping kings of the jungle and the towering statues atop the grand palace.