Subjective or suggestive, visually,
physically, experimentally accounting for
a specific period of time.
Inevitably art confronts the realities faced
to the point where we are allowed a view
beyond what is presented to why it is so.

More complicated than mathematics, as
simple as politics, lines converging into
our present from past
misunderstandings. Can you not see
or hear the tonal range, words dripping
from a page? Open your mind.

A camera recording what is not always there
but should be. Possibility or probability,
classic or contemporary.
This is art. Representational mystery,
soothing reckless souls, enraptured and
necessary to deal with the pain of life itself.

© 2023 j.g. lewis 

As Black Friday approaches, our thoughts turn to consumerism and, perhaps, lining up at the malls to get the best deals and lowest prices on items we desire. 
   Or not. 
   We are entering the season of giving, the time of year where gifts for friends and family become top of mind, where even an unplanned walk down an unfamiliar street leads into some retail establishment or another. 
   It is also, traditionally, the time of year when appeals from charities find their way into your mailbox or inbox. 
   The signs are everywhere. 
   I walked through Toronto’s Dundas Square the other day, actually on my way to pick up a small gift for my daughter, when I noticed the electronic advertising looming large over the streets. 
20% of your neighbours are facing hunger
   The billboard, over the next few minutes, flashed statistics and facts about the current state of food insecurity in my city. 
   Hunger and homelessness; the necessities of life are lacking. 
   The signs are everywhere. Panhandlers here and there along the sidewalks, shelters filled to capacity, news reports on just how bad life is for many right now in this fractured world and uncertain economy, with the ebb and flow of our currencies, continual price increases and bankruptcies. 
   Everything indicates everybody will be spending less on gift-giving this holiday season. 
   We all feel it personally. How can we not? 
   The appeals from charities have not let up over the past year. It is no longer a “seasonal thing”. 
   Hunger is an issue everywhere, all the time. 
   You see and hear it on the global news. 
   Locally, we feel it even more. 
   The food drives for the unfortunate are unforgiving, and necessary. 
   This electronic billboard, smack dab in the middle of similar signs promoting the latest fashions and must-have devices, drives the point home. 
   I know the intent of the advertising is not to guilt you into giving, but I can’t help but feeling remorse, or shame. Or helpless 
   Recent reports indicate there have been 2.53 million food bank visits in Toronto this year alone, a 51 per cent increase year-over-year and the highest annual surge ever reported. 
   Locally, 30% of food bank clients are children and youth under the age of 18. 
   It’s more than sad; it is disgusting. 
   I feel it. 
   I have a warm home and bed to sleep in each night. I know where my next meal is coming from; have an adequately stocked pantry, and leftovers for when I don’t even have to think about cooking. 
   I also know many people in this city, and elsewhere, struggle to put food on the table, and pay rent, and, and. . . etc…, etc … .
   I am fortunate. It is only fair, and only just, that I share some of what I have. In the true spirit of the season, I intend to give more this season, to increase what I have donated to a few select charities over the year. 
   I must; I am able to do so. 
   If you are able to give, do so.  
   Please. We need to care more for each other.
   This time of year, especially in a year like this, charity (and need) is so close to home. 

This day, unlike others before (except yesterday), showed much 

less promise than possibility. I succumbed to my inner rhythm,  

inconsistent and less palpable than days previous, doing slightly  

more than nothing of consequence. Productivity can be such an 

immeasurable notion, and one I do not feel today (slightly less  

than yesterday). After the fact, I find it far less distressing than  

depressive. I can only concern myself with what will become of  

this restless, repressive malady, neither curious nor causative. I  

fumbled my way through today, and likely will tomorrow. My  

ever-present tension: present tense. The past comes rushing back. 

Deadlines mean so little when you’re not paying attention to time. 

© 2023 j.g. lewis

I have no space in my heart for war.

   I am fearful, and saddened, by continued conflict on foreign soils that I have grown up watching on television and reading in the news. I cannot get past the hatred expressed by bombs, and guns, and the death of innocents unable to defend themselves.

   I am distressed by the threat of war. I have no space in my mind to even try to comprehend such action.

   I have no room in my heart for war.

   I do, however, have the greatest respect for those who have served this country, or made the ultimate sacrifice, so that I, that we, may live as we do now.

   It is not hypocritical.

   It is honest.

   I grew up listening to the horrors of war. I grew up attending, annually, Remembrance Day ceremonies. Armistice Day, as observed by commonwealth nations, marks the end of the First World War. We learned of the war, and those that followed, from a very young age, in textbooks, through the media, or from our parents.

   The stories were not lost on me, but truly didn’t sink in until the end of my teenage years.

   As, then, staff photographer at a mid-sized daily Canadian newspaper, I was assigned to cover the annual November 11 ceremony at a cemetery on the outskirts of the city.

   As a photographer you learn to hover on the edges of an event. I, not wanting to disrupt the ceremony — and wanting to pay respect to those who were there for greater reasons than I — tucked myself behind a tree, attached my telephoto lens, then watched and waited for the right shot.

   The crowd was not small, rain threatened, and veterans still stood tall in their uniforms, blue blazers and berets, medals displayed proudly. Their postures straightened as a bugle played The Last Post.

   I watched as a man in a wheelchair began to shudder, his head bowing down. I then watched as the soldier next to him reached over and placed a hand his shoulder. I was watching through a 200 mm lens, the complete picture of the scene and the crowd was not important to me.

   The sound of the bugle filled the air. I pressed the shutter button a few times, capturing the intimacy of this small act, then my eyes began to cloud with tears. I lowered my camera and broke down.

   I tried to remain silent behind the tree. My eyes were no longer fixed through the camera lens, but sweeping the crowd. I watched aging veterans, wives and widows, and sons and daughters honouring family.

   The impact of the wars, on me, was felt more deliberately than ever before.

   After any event, as a photographer, you search out the subjects of your photograph to get names (and correct spellings). This particular photograph would not require the soldiers to be identified as I shot mostly from behind and they were simply the two men, in a crowd of many, who were not identifiable, as such. I could have easily offered a cutline in the next day’s paper identifying the men as “veterans”. I did not think it as respectful, or I wanted to know who these men were. I had been profoundly affected.

   When asked, both men proudly provided their names, ranks, and details of where they served. I was also invited to the Legion Hall where a simple lunch was planned.

   I went, and I sat and listened to men who were not regaling themselves of war stories, but sharing memories of friendship, of comradery, and of duty.

   I have no place in my heart for war.

   But I have room to remember those who defended this country and others; proud soldiers who defended the lives of others across the globe. The numbers have dwindled over the years.

   They were fathers, and husbands, grandfathers. They meant something to their families, and to me.

   I still tear up on Remembrance Day.

   Some years I will watch the beautiful ceremony broadcast from the National War Memorial in Ottawa. I have visited the Cenotaph in Winnipeg, on Memorial Boulevard, and sat through the ceremony. There is nothing as dramatic as the cannons going off as a sign of respect, heightened by the silence between each shot.

   I cannot help but stop for a moment each Remembrance Day, wherever I am, and offer a silent prayer.

   I have no room in my heart for war, yet, if I am to claim peace the most important goal, I am also to acknowledge, and dare I say, respect, war, and Canada’s peacekeeping role throughout the world.

   No, it is not hypocritical; it is the reality we are faced with.

   War is a reality we are all forced to live with, sadly.

   That should not stop us from hoping, for praying, for peace.

Lest We Forget.

© 2018 j.g. lewis

Nightly news ends the day, 
high-definition Technicolor sending its shadow 
into the night. 
 
Beyond sleep, in dreary dreams, unforgettable atrocities live on. 
 
You can change channels by remote control to  
a different perspective on the same scenes of violence,  
hatred and heartbreak. 
 
Death defies even the most optimistic insight. 
 
Politics play out in accustomed inferiority. 
A stance is only a stance when symptoms 
become less obvious than the solution. 
 
Ideology counters idealism. 
 
The ever-present conflict and  
humanitarian efforts dammed by inaction. 
Nothing changes, if ever. It only grows worse. 
 
Internationally. Nationally. And locally. 
 
Few prospects for peace, one month in, 
events of the days accelerate. 
How hopeless are we? How hapless? 
 
Each of us; all of us know the cause and effect. 
 
The news reports bring it all home, into  
our comfortable bedrooms. 
How can we sleep? 
 

© 2023 j.g. lewis