About

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Callings:  Evolution of a Mid-Life Crisis

About Daniel Mark Picture Poems

Words and pictures: two arts together etched in the mind.

This website is about memories: making them, keeping them, and sharing them in memorable and beautiful ways.

The mission of Daniel Mark Picture Poems is simple:  to create beautiful ways to record wonderful memories.

The mind creates its own pictures from words. Photographs and words accentuate each other, and stimulate the senses. And regardless of the words, I like to think that these picture poems create a beautiful accent to any room. But the words, well, you be the judge. I hope the words are memorable.

The earliest communications in human history involved grunting, pointing, and other guttural noises.  Along came words, then sentences, then stories and poems.  Poems were used to record history, orally, because there were not yet written languages to record events and memories.  Poems were used because they were, simply, more memorable, and thus more able to be passed along.  This website, these words, and the gifts offered here, are intended to make memories more memorable.  It’s that simple.

And I think people like poems much more than they admit or know.  Why do I think that?  Because they love to listen to songs, and songs are poems put to music, or maybe even music put to poems.  And they like to understand them. Think about how many radio and TV commercials involve song lyrics or rhymes.  Marketers understand that those lyrics, those rhymes, help to set the product or service in the potential buyer’s mind.  They know you, in some ways, better than you know yourself.

I always enjoyed creating with words, and I wanted people to know what I meant.

And I wanted to create beautiful things.  But, I did not and do not have the talent to draw, or to paint, or to sculpt, or to sing or to act, or to make beautiful music.

But I like to put words together to create images, to convey ideas, to inspire thoughts and emotions, and to touch.

And that is how this website came to be.

Daniel Mark Picture Poems Inc. is a “Calling” come to life!
My words and your pictures, together, making their own kind of music.

I hope you enjoy the site!

 
Years ago I wrote a poem for my wife on the eve of our wedding.
It was called “How Could We Have Ever Known?
We asked a friend to read it in the ceremony.  He did a great job.
We put the poem with our wedding picture.
We later had the poem etched onto matting.
It was beautiful!

 

People started asking me to write something
for their events, celebrations, friends and loved ones.
Thus was born Daniel Mark Picture Poems Inc.

 

          CALLINGS

People seem to run from words
that work in measured time,
unless of course a guitar twangs,
laid on top of drummer’s bangs,
and voices rise in unison,
ending lines in rhyme.
Then they stand with hands upraised,
waving with the rhythm,
grasping notes in pulsing air,
eyes transfixed in forward stare,
as if the singer on the stage
can lead them to a promised land
if they could go with him.
My words are but a whisper;
there is no screaming throng.
They do not seek crescendo
and urge no one to follow,
but ask you now to slow your mind
to linger over simple words,
to hear a tuneless song.
This is a quiet calling,
that seeks no awe-struck crowd,
but tries to make connection
through sober introspection,
urging minds to quiet place
where thoughts and dreams dance silently,
and slip from saffron shroud.

 

Now there are many poems, on many subjects, covering many of life’s events:
  • the birth of a child or the death of a loved one;
  • graduations and accomplishments;
  • love, engagements, weddings, anniversaries;
  • pets;
  • memorials, friendship, home, sports and more.
  • Some favorite pieces have been commissioned poems on different subjects. I love doing these!
  • One man asked me to write something for his wife who suffers from Alzheimer’s disease. It was titled “An Orchid for Gloria” and focused on their married life of many years, and her love of growing beautiful orchids.
  • Another young man asked me to write a tribute for his father who died over 25 years ago. His father was a WWII veteran, a restaurant owner and an avid fisherman. I put copies of three old photos of his father into the finished piece, all double matted in gold against a rich, dark brown background, along with an original poem entitled “The Eyes of My Father.”  It proudly hangs in his home right now.
  • Another family wanted an heirloom to commemorate their father.  He was a WWII vet, and  I wrote a poem called “Because of You” to honor his life.  Each of his children (now all grown) proudly display one in their homes.

 

I like to think that “An Orchid for Gloria” and “The Eyes of My Father”  and “Because of You” are heirlooms that will be passed on to the next generation to hang proudly in another generation’s family room or photo gallery.  In fact, all of the pieces are intended to be heirlooms—a proud and unique place for your photographs!

 

All of the poems, except for the “photo poems,”
are intended to be part of
a presentation with your photo,
or that of someone close to you
 
  • to celebrate,
  • to contemplate,
  • to remember,
  • to commemorate.

 

A gift for forever.

Two Arts Together: A Beautiful Vision Etched on the Mind.

 

I hope you enjoy my “Calling” as much as I do!
Daniel Mark Extrom
  September 2013

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