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This is the story of how “Red Rose” came about, and what inspired me in the beginning to write the poem and create the pictures:
“I am the person who wrote the poem - Randy Stahla (Randyapple on Deviant Art), and I wrote it in English and asked a friend of mine to translate it into Japanese.
At the place where I work, there is a small garden in front of one of the buildings. There was a very beautiful rose bush in the center of the garden, and I used to make an effort every day to pass by the garden to see the roses. The garden is raised up above ground level about 2 feet, so the rose bush was especially striking in the sunlight.
One weekend we had a big ice storm, and when I came back the next week, the ice had clung to all the roses so that they were covered; then they dropped to the ground. I was also having some very difficult personal struggles at the time, so I suppose I saw myself in the destruction of the roses. Part of my struggle had to do with all the suffering in the world and the destruction of nature by wars and corporate interests.
But in a few days the sun came out, and a week or so later there was another cluster of roses that had grown above the original roses, and it was more beautiful than ever. I was amazed at this, and this event was the inspiration for writing the poem as well as bringing a rose home to study and draw, and creating my version of it using a computer graphics program. "Red Rose" was born, and I put it on my web site.”
Randy Stahla
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