Paul Beckman – Five Photographs


 Lotus - Bronx Botanical Garden

 Lotus – Bronx Botanical Garden


Kingdom Waves Bonaire

Kingdom Waves Bonaire


Musée d'Orsay Paris

Musée d’Orsay Paris


 

Back yard Madison CT

Back yard Madison CT


 

Bark S. Carolina

Bark S. Carolina


 

Artist’s Statement on Beauty

“I’m in the Caribbean, the island of Bonaire where the water is warm and clear blue, I take the ferry out to a small island, Klein Bonaire, I’m dropped off into the water to begin a drift snorkel with the tide pushing me slowly towards the beach to be picked up an hour or so later. I swim in-between and over the coral following the fish, sharing their world taking their pictures and all the time not thinking of anything other than finding a turtle to swim with or an octopus to follow as it scuttles into its hiding place changing colors as it goes to match the colors of the coral. I watch trumpet fish and cornet fish swimming vertical–their bright blue and yellow colors–a school of blue tangs heading for somewhere only they know. A barracuda hovers sideways looking at me with one eye and all the time the sea fans  waving in the currents, the Elkhorn coral grows high and I swim around it and I follow one fish after another, a moray eel, spotted and winding on the sand captures my attention as does a half dozen squid and finally I end up on the beach only to watch the ferry heading back and I’ll have to swim a while longer until the next one comes to pick me up. I spot a jellyfish, swim under it and take its picture with the sky above. This is a good beautiful day.”


 

Paul Beckman’s story, “Healing Time” was one of the winners in the Queen’s Ferry 2016 Best of the Small Fictions. His stories are widely published in print and online in the following magazines amongst others: Connecticut Review, Playboy, Pank, Blue Fifth Review, Flash Frontier and Metazen. His latest collection, Peek, weighed in at 65 stories and 120 pages. More at:  paulbeckmanstories.com and  pincusb.com