Photographs often capture and present moments. To collect these moments and for the great good health of body and mind, I take walks—yes, I walk my neighborhood streets daily and also beyond—and I capture moments, sometimes with the camera on my iPhone, sometimes with a few words, and sometimes with both. Snap snap. I regularly walk in my neighborhood where I have lived for 95 percent of my life. And, yes, it’s often awfully familiar, but there is always something new to see. Snap snap.

Poems, too, can capture and present these moments—especially short poems such as haiku and haiku-like poems. I capture and presents such moments in both my photographs and my poems, and often I combine the two in what are called photo-haiga.* At other times I merge both into longer narratives that may tell a story, but more often present a flow of images and words that magnify and transmit thoughts, feelings, and dream-traces.

*“Haiga [paintings] are typically painted by haiku poets (haijin), and often accompanied by a haiku poem.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haiga—with my photos standing in for the paintings.

pleased with pi by Alan Bern

When I first saw this pleasant stool, I saw pi and was pleased with the three-dimensional version of the formula. I also appreciated the green surround that encloses with comfort, but spares any claustrophobic element, open air. On an uphill walk, a perfect place to stop and breathe—I did.

loving hand by Alan Bern

The trilingualism—English, Spanish, and photo-image—of this work is delightful to me. This stone street sign for Amador Ave, a loving tree-branch hand above. Two blocks from home. And the warm touch colors of both stone and tree.

different beauties by Alan Bern

Is the painted side of the fence more finished and “healthy” than the peeling side? Is it a continuum? That depends on one’s view of development and history, I wager. Both have their beauties—and it needs to be said: the peeling side has the hinges, which implies that one could enter, transit, even learn more there. In any world, both sides keep on, and that includes ours.

porch Torah by Alan Bern

Sometimes shadows create miraculous shapes.

Alan Bern is a retired children’s librarian and cofounder with artist/printer Robert Woods of Lines & Faces, an illustrated poetry broadside press/publisher. His work has recently appeared in CERASUS, Mediterranean Poetry (odyssey.pm/contributors/alan-bern/), Slouching Beast Journal, and Mercurius. Alan has won awards for his work, including a medal from SouthWest Writers for his story The Return of the Very Fierce Wolf of Gubbio to Assisi, 1943 CE [and now, 2013 CE] and first runner-up with his poem “Boxae” for the Raw Art Review’s first Mirabai Prize for Poetry, 2020. He is the author of No no the saddest (Fithian Press), Waterwalking in Berkeley (Fithian Press), and greater distance (Lines & Faces). Alan performs with the dancer Lucinda Weaver as PACES and with musicians from Composing Together. You can find Alan on Instagram: @abobern, Facebook: alan.bern.1, Twitter: @AlanBern1, and at linesandfaces.com.