Beautiful day - suitable occasion for a nice illusion

Or at least a question. Why is the reflection in the middle on the right apparently superimposed on the building in the background, but apparently behind the building on the lower left? I could almost believe it isn't a reflection, but I can assure you, it is.

Self-portrait.

I am reminded somewhat of T.S. Elliot's Hollow Men, which always seemed to me to be a very personal statement.

Between the idea

And the reality

Between the motion

And the act

Falls the Shadow

O WHAT can ail thee, knight-at-arms, 

Alone and palely loitering? 

The sedge has wither’d from the lake, 

And no birds sing.

from Keats. La Belle Dame Sans Merci

I have often wondered about that phrase, "sedge has wither’d " - perhaps this is it.

But no, this is Florida. The only armored objects are the alligators, though I suppose the manatees might do for the Belle Dames. A happy thought

I saw their starved lips in the gloam, 

With horrid warning gaped wide, 

Sounds like alligators, so cruelly abandoned by their manatees...

Three reflections and one bird. Early morning, Merritt Island.

Oh, by the way, the picture's upside down. Even knowing that, my eye rebels at the notion that the thing at the bottom is the real bird. The original is a rather odd picture as it has the two birds in the foreground (that in the upside down version are in the background), although they are just reflections in the water. The fact that you can only see their reflections seems odd. At least it does to me. Really, my mind only works in two dimensions. I wonder how a bird would see it?

Visiting the land of the terminally cute ("world" perhaps, as we have Disney World on this eastern side of the continent, Disney Land is on the western side). Here's a cute picture from Seattle. What makes something "cute"? Perhaps a promise of better things, the potential of the young. There is of course a darker side to it. "Cute" also equates to "vulnerable", "dependent", "fragile". How many of these survive to adulthood?

It's lake Washington, Seattle, at least there are no alligators.

Now even falls

And fresh, cold breezes blow

Adown the grey-green mountain side

Strewn with rough boulders. Soft and low

Night speaks, her tongue untied

Darkness to darkness calls.

From Robert Graves, The Mountain Side at Evening, his first published poem. The picture was taken just east of the Columbia River a minute or so after this one. It was a wonderful flight.

Another picture of departures. It's not immediately obvious what's going on. The tree reflected in the building (on the right)  is the tree in front of the building (on the left) only it seems to be in the wrong place. The clue is the side of the building visible on the extreme right. The building is actually at an odd angle. Nice little visual puzzle, something to ponder while leaving the city behind.