An Old Photo
excerpted from "For an album";
Adrienne Rich (1987)
...
Our story is of moments
when even slow motion moved too fast
for the shutter of the camera:
words that blew our lives apart, like so,
eyes that cut and caught each other...
...our story is
how still we stood,
how fast."
That still fresh old photograph of you
astride a spotted pony, bare feet
dangling as limply as your torn dress:
the background was a high veranda,
cool green trimmed with gingerbread.
A small boy sat the animal with you --
two solemn and handsome children
upon a well-fed pony, photographed
by an itinerant in the thirties --
the time frozen as long as the picture
or our fading memories of it may last.
Some say the boy, our brother,
did little in his forty-six years;
but now, we see his boy's eyes,
soft, liquid, serious, sad,
no hint of smile about them.
We weep his loss.
And you, sister:
alert, protective, girl's face
set to fend off the world --
cast so early in your role
as the family glue
holding us all together.
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