Basilica

Two noted Maryland authors teamed up to produce Basilica, an intense collection of photography and poetry. George Miller and Donald Shomette view their subjects through a single lens. Theirs is a true collaboration, a process in which images and words intermingle and grow.Basilica begins with the Baltimore Basilica as a sanctuary from the turbulent events of the 1960s. A desperate mother brings her shell-shocked son to the Sunday service hoping he might find peace after the trauma of Vietnam. 'We’re here, we’re safe, no bombs, no guns, you’re home.'Fifty-six poems and stories spread over seven sections lead the reader through decades along Maryland’s western shore of the Chesapeake Bay.SANDHILL CRANES - 'The cranes descend, wings feathers brake, feet forward, one with the marsh, they land, dance, forage.'BALANCE BEAM - 'Know it, become it, feel the padded suede beneath your naked feet, the spring within the wood, the space above the beam.'FLAT BOTTOMS, GOD BLESS’EM - 'Master of tides snaking curlicue channels into the marsh, slithering back to the broad water.'VIETNAM - 'The wind blows warm from the delta at dawn, hot from the hill country at noon, sleep, dawn, direction fail me, time is forever noon and hot.'A PALM BEACH BLESSING - 'May the star in the east guide your petroleum engineers to oil deposits under the desert.'ON READING JUNG’S SEVEN SERMONS TO THE DEAD - 'Wings of the white bird hover over my hydrangea, incessant figure eights along serpentine garden paths strobe, stroke, beat.'