BIBLIOGRAPHY

"Cicada (Okanagana spp.)." Royal Alberta Museum:Invertebrate Zoology Bug Facts. 24 Oct. 2004. Royal Alberta Museum. 22 Sept. 2008 <http://www.royalalbertamuseum.ca/natural/insects/bugsfaq/cicada.htm>.

"diatom." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2008. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 22 Sep. 2008 <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/161817/diatom>.

My Connection:

A “connection” is considered one of the most powerful and sacred relationships in the world. Many times it is described as the one that mothers and their offspring share or the one between twins. But why is it that these relationships are more important, more powerful than the less obvious connection? In other words, can a powerful relationship exist between two seemingly unconnected topics?

In this case, the two objects are a haiku about cicadas and an image of an alga. Just as any other topics, the connections between them are numerous. However, the main connections I see are that they are both expressions of life, both were part of my childhood in my grandmother’s garden and both expressions of art.

Life, in its many worded definition, is a state of being. Just as an image of a deceased human being, lying in a coffin, can signify death, so too can an image of an alga, represent life. Because the picture was taken to represent the life of the alga, it represents how that species functions and its life. The same can be said about the haiku. Because the topic of the haiku is cicadas, especially of how they sing, it is a representation of a living creature, a representation of the life of a cicada. So although it may be understood different ways, these images are still expressions of life in my understanding.

These images are not only expressions of life in large, they also represent my childhood in my grandmother’s garden. As a child, I would spend my days exploring the pond, filled with algae, cleaning the fountain of algae and searching for frogs, all to the lazy cicadas’ song. So now when I hear the cicadas chime, my thoughts wander back to those blissful days of exploration, tending to Mother Nature and her tricks of clogging up the drains. So although not a direct correlation between the two topics, this memory is what gives me the deeper understanding of both.

Finally, these two abstract topics are related because they are both expressions of art. The haiku is art because it is able to create, with words, an image. Just with words, the poem fully describes the song of a cicada, capturing the haunting melody as well the memory associated with it. Similarly, the alga is also art because it is a representation of what the alga looks like in life, though in great detail. It is a three-dimensional illustration to make it seem real, though it is only an impression of life. So because they both are created as impressions of life, the key word being impression of life, they can be called art.

These connections, though distant and obscure as expressions of life, childhood memories and expressions of art, are there to direct a deeper understanding of a topic or even life, on the larger scale. And though these connections are individualized by each viewer, they are vital to the world function. The significance of knowing that all connections are equally important could mean an unexpected amount of solutions. If everyone contributed their own connections between topics, there would be a mountain of solutions to a seemingly unsolvable problem.  And so the power of connections is revealed.