I don’t keep photos.
Flat, thin, whisfering,
They hold only shades of sight
Buried beneath cellophane and silicon,
Framed up in and around bare walls.
A picture is not worth a thousand words;
A memory is worth the substance of the darkness
Cast by a photograph, or a thousand.
Memories fill up with sun,
Leap into shadow;
The warm loom of a cliff at my back,
The wine-and-sunset smell of light on the lake,
Minnesota wind blowing through the leaves
And the disappearing picture
Of myself.
I don’t want to see myself,
I want to ride remembrance like a starling,
Whistling out the trembling song of the past
In suspended notes
That look back at
Fading peaks.
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