Ben Hopper

Hi-Magniva 💞🦎
Reut Lian Shirazi for ‘Human Nature’.

Apr 22, 2025. Mount Carmel above Megadim, Israel.
Full set on Patreon.

What do you call the feeling of these views? The attached music reveals 💓

“… What if I’d never been through finds
Of sorrow, wailing loans
What if I’d never seen through that
To the fields of our home

… When all falling down is just the travelling need
Of a wave
And the burn of salt in the cuts come around
Heal again”

Welcome back again to the fields of our home 💞

📸 Erika Suzuki for ‘Human Nature’.
March 29, 2021. Atlit beach, Israel.
Full set on Patreon.

“Home is where the heart is”

Photos: Reut Lian Shirazi, photographed for my project ‘Human Nature’.
Apr 22, 2025. Mount Carmel above Megadim, Israel.
Full set on Patreon.

This is Hof HaCarmel, where I grew up in Israel. Just 45° to the left is Atlit, my hometown, a couple of inches from the Mediterranean Sea. Where Reut’s eyes fall, her own home rests below.

This is where I began, and the place I left when I went exploring. I’ve been away for 15 years. Now I’m back, and as T.S. Eliot wrote:

“We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.”

I can finally feel like I know this place all over again.
It’s like love at first sight: a first date, and I’m already in love.
There’s so much to see, so much to do.
We’ve only just begun.

הוי ארצי! מולדתי!
זהב הדר שמח.
מושבה לא נושבה,
זית אצל זית.
דקל רב כפים.
נחל כמה מים.
ריח פרדסי אביב.
חל חולות לים סביב.
כרם גפן נים לא נים.
ריח פרדסי אביב
שיר צלצל גמלת
בים של אור טובע כל,
ועל פני כל התכלת.

תודה לך רעות על החברות והאמון. על ההזדמנות לראות את הבית.
על המזכרת מרגע מיוחד.