One Picture of Me
By Mike Garofalo
When Laurence asked for poems on the theme of "Self-Portrait" I though of a long philosophical poem I wrote about the interrelated subjects of Picturing and Describing.
One set of examples I used in that long poem was the human skull. I spoke of memories of Halloween in East Los Angeles, where Mexican Skulls, calaveras, filled displays on El Dia De La Muerte. Meaningful from artistic and religious perspectives.
The brief poem I'm sharing today is a excerpt about my own skull as Pictured by medical imaging, and described by me and interpreted by the oral surgeon.
"This bony skull of mine
electrified
pictured onscreen for me.
Doctor recommends
some oral surgery.
The brain disappeared,
an empty space
sliced from
X Ray images retraced.
Eyeless in inner space.
Monkey nose holes,
bony eye glasses,
teeth glowing in the dark.
Inner spaces never seen
underneath my very being.
Skinless, noseless, earless,
a shape, a form—
the images informed.
Stripping away the unneeded,
revealing my inner core."
So, as we all know, a single picture or image can cause a flow of ideas, interpretations, and feelings in our minds.
Or, just two words can please, excite or inflame our minds. Our lover's name can explode our feelings.
But, just two other words can frighten our moral being.
For example,
Donald Trump ...
[pause, raise your elbow]
Kick Him Out.
See you on the street next Saturday.
The above "brief poem" will be printed in
The SkullCrushing Hummingbird
Zine #7, in Portland, Oregon,
on 10/12/2025.
Commentary: Off the Cuff
So, considering, have you ever seen
a picture or a video or a drawing
of a Skull Crushing Hummingbird,
crushing an insect's Skull
with its tiny beak or flashing wings?
No, you have not,
and that is just one reason why,
you don't believe
that Skull Crushing Hummingbirds
are really alive.
However,
Words, context, technical knowledge,
and intent claim meaningfulness,
even truth,
in addition to any pictures viewed.
The surgeon and I see differently.
Sometimes, though, we reader's prefer
fantasies and fictional
Skull Crushing Hummingbirds
to any ho-hum boring beings-
a moniker for fun memories.
***********************
Pictures mirroring things
displaying aspects of reality
uncovering hidden realms of being
pointing to more clear correspondence.
Show me a good picture - Please!
We drew pictures in caves
Heroes pictured in statues
Books illustrated pictured facts
Drones picture our towns from above
Hubble sends us clear pictures of Space
Our brains are
Picture processing ... Machines-
and you can picture mindfulness
you can picture your intent verbally...
picturing is a form of meaningfulness.
Science and technology have
invented new ways of picturing
so we can see into Reality
and open our ordinary eyes
to new ways of seeing.
Picturing - Defining
Planning - Imagining
Painting - Photography
Reflecting - Mimicking
Do I see what I mean?
Wittgenstein in the Tractatus of 1921
Used Pictures and Picturing as the
criterion of meaningfulness and truth.
Wittgenstein in the Investigations of 1953
changed to talking about our talking
about, in ordinary words, aspects of Picturing.
The best pictures, the best descriptions,
how we talk in everyday ways,
point to correspondence, mirroring,
a theory of epistemology.
Richard Rorty disagreed.
**********************************
Bundled Up, Volume 1
Quintains, Pentastichs, Tankas
Gushen Grove Sonnets
Highway 101 and 1: A Docu-Poem
California, Oregon, Washington
25 Steps and Beyond
The Poetry by Mike Garofalo
