rick

@rickehling

🩺🚶✍️ 📷 🌿🌱🍽️ San Francisco 🌅 #poetry, #opinions, #flowers, #art, #awe #healthcare ©, or credited outrage (when I must).

230 Siguiendo940 Seguidores5163 Publicaciones

Bluesky

¿Es tu perfil?Reclámalo y rickehling.dirty.social es tuyo.Reclamar perfil

rick@rickehling· 25d

sand changes with every next wave storm strewn, swept newborn clean every day eroding every day reborn ©️ Rick Ehling ✍️ 07/18/2026, 📷 06/28/2026 #dailyhaikuprompt (beach) #tanka 🌊🏖️♻️🌅🌄 #California #thePacific #lookingnorthwest

The sea and surf meets the sand and cliffs along HWY1 at Pescadero and the San Mateo County shore (about 1/2 way between Santa Cruz and San Francisco

rick@rickehling· 25d

#silentsunday #Tassajara #thepathtothezendo #theWilderness #inthecanyon #California #lookingsouth 📷 06/25/2026

This is the path along the canyon and creek on which the entire temple/village/community grounds are rested upon. I walked it multiple times daily for a week in the light and in the dark. Such a special place.

rick@rickehling· 26d

#SFSidewalkHaiku #268 thorns, ivy, rusty metal What cares clematis in her race to stars ©️ Rick Ehling ✍️ 07//2026 📷 05/14 #Haiku #haikusaturday #clematis 🌱

A clematis bloom in a plant that escaped a bit to the stairs up Bernal Heights Hill

rick@rickehling· 29d

#sumac staghorn sumac in bloom across eastern 🇨🇦 it grows down into the midAtlantic and the Midwest 🇺🇸. The fruit makes a nice alternative to lemonade and yes, the fruit can be dried and powdered as an alternative to mid-eastern sumac. 🍽️🍷🌱🌿

rick@rickehling· Jul 14

#alphabetchallenge #weekBforBehind #sleepingnude #cadmus #socialrealism Sleeping Nude, 1967, Paul Cadmus, tempura on paperboard, 6”x12”. 🇺🇸 🏳️‍🌈 🖼️ note the book titled #Ingres (will be interesting to see whether the bots find admittedly a bit more male nudity more gate requiring than female)

Paul Cadmus (1904-1999)
Sleeping Nude
signed 'Cadmus' (lower right)--signed again and inscribed with title (on the backing)
tempera on paperboard
6 x 12 in. (15.2 x 30.5 cm.), image; 8 ¾ x 15 in. (22.2 x 38.1 cm.), board
Painted in 1967.

Sold at Christies, Nov 2014

rick@rickehling· Jul 13

#alphabetchallenge #weekBforBehind #GrandeOdalisque #Ingres #romanticism La Grande Odalisque, 1814, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, oil on canvas, 35”x64”. #Louvre #Paris 🇫🇷 🖼️ 📷 10/12/2024

La Grande Odalisque, 1814, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, oil on canvas, 35”x64”. #Louvre #Paris 🇫🇷 🖼️

A female nude painted from behind

rick@rickehling· Jul 12

For #smallpoemsunday @tomsnarsky.bsky.social ‘As for What the Rain Can Do’ by #DAPowell #poetry from The Paris Review As I am in summer shower territory and they’re both on Bluesky

wash me in blossoms yet to come
lift my boat

flood the rice fields where the egret lands
complex math

rinse off a bench
turn on a dime

give you something to think about
feed an aspiring stream

tell you by thunder it's coming
stand you up

play a little music on the rooftop
get a body good and wet

open the golden tulips
mix us a drink

rick@rickehling· Jul 12

Cal-i-for-ni-a making the art of haiku so much easier © Rick Ehling ✍🏼 05/20/2026 📷 06/24/2026 #senryu #senryusunday #3lines #5syllablewords #California #tassajaracreek (which does the same)

The creek/stream at Tassajara was warm and alive - warm from a hot spring which heats the monastery’s bath and pool and the rocks baking in the sun. There were fish, turtles, snakes, and happy humans as well as whatever the canyon holds that needs a drink.

rick@rickehling· Jul 12

#SkySunday #silentsunday #quebec #drummondville #agriculture 🚜🚆🌽🌾🥦🧅🍅🍓, 📷 07/10 (from the train)

A window shot with the ghost image of a fellow passenger looking out at green and flat, everywhere. A gutter of plants, a service road and corn, a lot of corn, some soybeans, some wheat, some resting fields with green fertilizers, some brassica, tomatoes, and strawberries

rick@rickehling· Jul 10

leaving #Montreal #theStLawrence 🚆🌽 #Drummondville #quebec 🇨🇦📷 07/10

The train bridge crossing over the St Lawrence. Heading east.

rick@rickehling· Jul 8

Good Morning East Coast have you seen my jet lag ?

A glimpse of today from my bed sans fatigue. A surprise after what was 14 hours to cross a continent - but I had a good book, a notepad, soccer, more than a bit of wine, a mostly quiet neighbor, and a rather chatty muse. All in all more than I deserve but welcome.

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/13 and fin A Pessimist’s Death poem How many more times will the wrong lever be pulled A trolley problem

A Pessimist’s Death poem

How many more times
will the wrong lever be pulled
A trolley problem

Worth googling the trolley problem if it’s new to you.

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/12 Almost done… A Realist’s Death poem Person, woman, man, camera, TV The sad last words he spoke clearly

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/11 three more, hang in there… An Optimist’s Death poem Fire works and then an unexpected announcement Happy birthday 🇺🇸

An Optimist’s Death poem

Fire works and then an
unexpected announcement
Happy birthday 🇺🇸

Cheated a bit with the emoji but like it.

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/10 Fetishist death poem A French maid outfit Seemed an odd request but it works for this corpse

Fetishist death poem

A French maid outfit
Seemed an odd request but
it works for this corpse

Any companion piece I might have chosen would have been censored by Bluesky anyway. But goggle “whip” and “Mapplethorpe”. In adult browse.

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/9 Death poem in the Classics tradition Don’t expect from our broken Senate the courage to nudge Nero’s end

Death poem in the Classics tradition

Don’t expect from our
broken Senate the courage
to nudge Nero’s end

Oath of the Horatii, 1784-5, by David, in the collection of the Louvre. From the net. A painting with heightened masculinity and militarism, still a tragic outcome and misplaced.

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/8 Imagist Death poem This bloated body requires an icebox So I ate the plums ©️ Rick Ehling ✍️ 07/02/2026

Imagist Death poem

This bloated body
requires an icebox
So I ate the plums

Think NYC Covid, and a tribute to the doctor poet WCW. My favorite of the series.

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/7 Vanitas Death poem The reflecting pool, a dead duckling, a tossed red hat This too shall end

Vanitas Still Life by Jan Van Kessel, 1667, in the collection of the National Gallery, Washington DC. Not vanity, not narcissism, but Vanitas. Might be nice to loan to the White House.

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/6 Mannerist Death poem No amount of known mortuary science could Elongate those hands

Portrait of a Halberdier, 1529-30, Pontormo. A reaction to the renaissance, Mannerism was about excess, maybe not gold leaf excess, maybe not billionaire excess, more extra joints on the hands and extra cervical vertebrae.

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/5 Rococo Death poem We dressed in pink, pale florals, toile, and ruffles to picnic on his grave

The Swing, 1767-68, Jean-Honoré Fragonard, also called The Happy Accident of Swings. Get it?

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/4 Pointillist Death poem Joyous daubs of light Sparkle and gleam Everywhere But his dull dead eyes

A detail of Seurat’s La parade de cirque, 1889, from Wikipedia.
Cause we’re watching a circus, not really a fun one, but still…

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/4 Brutalist Death Poem No amount of cement Can protect that grave

The Royal National Theatre, London, considered by many to be the preeminent Brutalist building. Not the Kennedy Center, yet, or a Presidential library, but something that might resist an angry crowd.

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

#deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/3

Dada Death poem

First dance
Then wait
To piss on a grave

Fountain - 1917, a readymade sculpture by Marcel Duchamp.

Duchamp described it as an "everyday objects raised to the dignity of a work of art by the artist's act of choice."

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

…and continuing on the theme of today Bauhaus Death poem different dancing another death hopefully this one - mine form follows function #deathpoem 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday 🧵/2

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

For #SmallPoemSunday a series of #deathpoem patterned on Japanese Death Poems 🇯🇵 a bit of outrage, directed, imagining death (well, one) in different styles* 🇺🇸 #poetry #Haiku #senryu #senryusunday🧵/1 *as a🩺 I’ll never wish harm, but I won’t mourn every loss

A Death poem on the
death of you know who

all this dancing
over a death
thankfully not mine

Japanese Death Poems, compiled and with an introduction by Yoel Hoffmann
If you’re looking for a great book on death poems, in Japanese and with translation, small biography, commentary, and explanation, this is the book. I would bring it to my resident clinic occasionally.

rick@rickehling· Jul 5

The Pacific meets sand. From the minor cliff/bluffs at Pescadero on a coastal drive up Hwy1 from Carmel (it’s all likely in fog now).

rick@rickehling· Jul 4

#SFSidewalkHaiku #267 here too roses crowd our city, our sight lines, our foggy dream scented air © Rick Ehling ✍🏼 07/01/2026, 📷 04/03 #dailyhaikuprompt (roses) #Haiku #haiga 🌱☀️🍃 💐 🌹 #haikusaturday #saturdayhaiku #SanFrancisco #BernalHeights

Roses, pale, pink, and scented, near the top of Bernal Heights Hill

rick@rickehling· Jul 2

#tankathursday #tanka #tassajara #stellarsjay Outside signs caution Stellar’s jays are aggressive but that is a jay This plastic might as well say The mountain’s water is wet © Rick Ehling ✍🏼 📷 06/2026 🐦‍🔥🚰

The one sign of instruction at Tassajara, on every table by the dining area, warning about the ubiquitous canyon jays and their appetites. These jays would land 3 feet from you and squawk for food or space. Still nothing about grass, running, or shoes, entering with which foot, bowing, etc. In this place of structure, this was the only sign.

rick@rickehling· Jul 1

#SFSidewalkHaiku #266 In salt spray In sand Flowers make “due” ©️ Rick Ehling ✍️ 07/01, 📷 06/28 #dailyhaikuprompt (morning due) #Haiku #senryu #Pescadero #thePacific #seasidewoolysunflower 🌱🌿

A patch of native coastal sunflower surrounded by ice plant on my drive home, up Highway 1

rick@rickehling· Jun 30

I was blessed last week with the start of another rotation around our sun and lucky to spend it at #Tassajara for a poetry retreat with the sublime Jane Hirshfield I was really hoping for #weekZforZen not #weekZforZany but zen can be zany too #alphabetchallenge #scape #California 📷 ⛩️