Benjamin Harnett
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benjaminharnett.com
Benjamin Harnett
@benjaminharnett.com
3.4K followers 660 following 5.2K posts
Sometime poet, historian, software engineer, novelist, union man. https://www.benjaminharnett.com https://thehappyvalleynovel.com
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benjaminharnett.com
Bonus shot
Another view of the lake, from the south end where the Susquehanna river begins. There are hills at three distances, piles of smooth boulders in the foreground, ripples of very blue lake and a hint of rocky bottom. Ducks are floating, dark shapes with tiny bills.
November 9, 2025 at 9:28 PM
benjaminharnett.com
The lake was pretty nice yesterday
An autumn vista of the lake—the waters are shallow here and part turquoise, part steel blue. A tree stands bare of leaves like a half-understood phrase, while the sky is full of clouds herding along, patches of pure blue piercing through. A sudden burst of sun streams down on the hillside illuminating bright patches of trees still clinging to their leaves.
November 9, 2025 at 9:16 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Stopping here!
A watercolor drawing of a prickly pear cactus
November 9, 2025 at 7:38 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Painting is hard
A watercolor of a prickly pear cactus that is in progress; a water color set off to one side; a brush is sitting on the paper—showing the action of painting is both just completed and about to continue. Now some more detail has been added; the foreground section of the cactus is painted in green. Continuing to struggle with the image, now the pot and stones are more defined. A somewhat closer up shot of the struggle of trying to get out of the awkward middle stage.
November 9, 2025 at 6:47 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Another moon pic
Mostly sky, a kind of faded lavender with the slightest tinge of orange; the treetops are like a rip along the bottom, some hairy bits, and the forest is a kind of brown that make me think of going for a big long sleep; the moon is small, white and hazy, but that’s just the phone camera. It could be the eye if the sky were a sea creature.
November 3, 2025 at 1:05 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Rocky road
It’s not really a road. It’s a weathered old stone boulder close up, with a sort of shelving effect. There is bright moss growing in patches, neon, and the palest lichens.
November 3, 2025 at 1:01 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Pending
The last little tufts of leaves belong to the poplars and the birches. They are gold. The trunks and branches white. The slanting field is brown and ochre. The sky is filled with bruisy clouds.
November 3, 2025 at 12:58 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Lens flare
A bit of late autumn fieldscape looking over some far hills. The sky is nodding toward an early sunset while the sun is focused into a bright ray through the dark oculus formed by some blackberry leaves. A kousa dogwood is deep red; the shadows are long.
November 3, 2025 at 12:50 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Dog in landscape
A mown patch of field starting to fade with fall, and beyond it, tall reedy stuff brown and gray, with tufts of seeds and distant trees denuded of leaves; some evergreens make up the hill that is rising up and a distant vista of hills looks like a sleeping bird; the clouds are ponderous and patchy with the brightest blue peeking in places; the dog is a Boston terrier and is poised to run, his head tracking the ball that is about to be launched. His shadow is dark as him.
November 3, 2025 at 12:47 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Really tough day today. Had to say goodbye to the king of cats, suddenly and unexpectedly. RIP Leo, you were a very very good kitty.
His serene fluffiness Leo, a Norwegian forest cat sitting on a chair-shaped scratching post, resplendent in morning sun. A grave covered with flat stones, some with moss, others lichens; the last resting place of Leo, who was a very very good kitty.
October 29, 2025 at 9:00 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Scenes from the lake break
Night mode shot of a dock jutting out onto still waters; the opposite side of the lake is bright with house lights shining brightly in clumps. A low hill is called Snake Hill, and it’s silhouetted black. The sky is day for night blue with a cloud shaped like a raised bushy eyebrow, reflecting into the lake. This morning the lake rippling, fog rising like smoke on the water and the clouds shining bright with reflected sunrise and another reflection of the yellow red like an orange Y in the water. A rusty old fire pit with hodgepodge wood piled up like a small tepee sending a shock of flames darting up and blurry with movement, casting sparks that arc through the photo. The same lake view with water rippling up into small waves that lap the shore. A low green hill is crouched like a fish; the dock juts out and turns right with an old chair sitting, expectantly at the very tip. A bright rainbow shoots up from the lake through a cloud trailing rain and formed like an explosion of sprites.
October 26, 2025 at 9:34 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Coupled trees
Two birch trees twining at the edge of the forest, the ground is a carpet of leaves and pine needles; the afternoon is dappling in gently making easy shadows of the rest of the trees. A Boston terrier is nosing around looking suspicious. There is a green algal cast on the rocks and lower trunks.
October 21, 2025 at 10:58 AM
benjaminharnett.com
A lemony sunset
Various hills like a cut paper silhouette, the sunset a spill of lemony ink across the clouds which slash along in seven different grays a barrier between the light and the leaving, where the sky is its own dark gray blue. The clouds above are different, fluffy or clotted.
October 21, 2025 at 10:52 AM
benjaminharnett.com
Happy little trees etc
Here is a pond reflecting pine trees and a deep blue sky through red maple leaves that are scattered across its surface. The ochre turf forms a line above which the trees jut upward while a branch of the maple slashes down with brighter red leaves still attached.
October 21, 2025 at 10:48 AM
benjaminharnett.com
After the rain
A shot of some trees with a field of goldenrod in between. There is a mist and some sumac leaves in front of things. Some mown fields, mists and dogs and clouds and especially the clouds look like rocky crags above the hills. Neon green grass and trees in the morning light. Low clouds and fog moving down the valley; the reds and yellows of the fall foliage are still bright. Closer up yellow goldenrod and the crimson leaves of blackberry bushes.
October 20, 2025 at 12:42 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Milkweed pod magic
A photo of a leathery brown milkweed pod with a fringe of bright white silk of seeds beginning to spool out of a crack. It looks exactly like a little caricature of a wizard from a Norse fairytale as done up in a whimsical watercolor by someone named Elka.
October 19, 2025 at 11:37 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Have I told you yet about my
A photo of packaging that advertises “3 balls of varying properties”.
October 15, 2025 at 12:36 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Sky was putting off some serious mood yesterday
A mown patch of green field with stalks of dead plants and low dark hills and some silhouetted trees in the mid-distance. But overhead a bit sprawling cloudscape in the sky, all dramatic as the low fall sun lights it, while some puffs of clouds are a row of shadowy dashes. The field all dry grasses and old milkweed stalks and a young elm tree at the center that will eventually tower in the middle of the field. The clouds are all piled up around it dramatically. Stormily.
October 13, 2025 at 7:47 PM
benjaminharnett.com
This combination of words is striking me as mordantly funny this morning, @tomtomorrow.bsky.social.
An email from Kickstarter: “You just backed Our Long National Nightmare / Now you can follow its progress”.
October 12, 2025 at 12:55 PM
benjaminharnett.com
The land that time forgot (aka my back yard)
There’s a lot going on here—big dark pine trees, clouds of all forms tinged yellow by afternoon sun, a wild black and white Boston terrier, yellowing leaves littering a patchy lawn, an over grown garden, forlorn looking fence posts, a low shed with a flat roof, dead trees, a half-built deck; bright colors, wild ideas.
October 9, 2025 at 10:19 AM
benjaminharnett.com
Night for day for night
A shot of the moon shining like the sun through a very old lilac tree twisting up over a metal roof with two looming brick chimneys. There are some visible stars in and out of the enormous halo of light. And the sumac leaves are going crimson in a primeval bunch at bottom right. The whole thing looks like day for night as shot in old films but it’s night; thanks iPhone night mode.
October 9, 2025 at 10:12 AM
benjaminharnett.com
The lilacs are confused. So am
I, tbh.
A photo of a tiny lilac bloom in October; behind is a stormy sky and a peach-colored Victorian Italianate house, all blurred to focus on the goddamned spring blooming tree blooming in Fall.
October 9, 2025 at 10:06 AM
benjaminharnett.com
If I give them true feedback I’m going to wind up on a list.
An email asking for feedback about United HealthCare.
October 6, 2025 at 2:55 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Is it me you love or just my
A photo of a kids’ toy box. The toy is 5 colorful rubber balls and it’s called “Big Knobby Balls”.
October 5, 2025 at 6:10 PM
benjaminharnett.com
Look at that
Deep blue sky, ochre and green field, tall brightly white birches still neon green, backed by orange and red leaves behind and some other green treetops. A deep shadow falling across the scene where the field dips down toward the edge of the forest.
October 4, 2025 at 2:13 PM