CAMERA
Light disperses the silver
on film in the shadow
and memory is trapped
in the blink of an eyelash.
The kiss, the laugh, the poised hoof
are framed in an instant.
A century ago Daguerre dipped a pencil
in the eye of the sun
and etched an image of man
on the surface of metal,
making the past present
and the dead men to linger
pursuing the living
with love from the lintel.
Memory clings to the wall
bent sapling, hair blowing
mast bent to the starboard.
The wind forever in motion
because time stumbles in darkness
on a splinter of light.
A.M. Sullivan
Thankyou for bring that poem to my attention I have never read that before - surely he did dip a pencil in the eye of the sun.
Talking about poems from my youth - I remember Rudyard Kipling´s IF painted on each side of the stage in the assembly hall of the Naval Training School.
[IF]
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master,
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ‘em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
—Rudyard Kipling
Welcome to Amy’s Place, Aruanan.
Looking forward to seeing you again soon.