A photograph
is a sliver, a fingernail clipping,
a shard of broken time.
It is a memory,
a souvenir, a fossil frozen
in the strata of history
and sentiment.
It is technology's
attempt at immortality;
at encapsulating a moment
of eternity's timeless clock,
and yet it has
no more permanence
than a butterfly's wing
in a raging fire;
no more validity
than the desperate hopes
of stricken Mankind.
A photograph
is a forlorn reminder
of lost youth and possibilities--
no longer young, no longer possible.
A contest entry
- Photograph.... by kiwigirljacks.
700 points, ended December 1, 2008, 19 entries
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
Please tell me what you think
Comments
1 - 10 of 10
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A sad take on the prompt! But yes, I agree.. sometimes these things can just be a reminder of the passing years can't they! Nicely done.
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Yes I quite agree, I hate looking at a younger me.
But as the photograph there are moments in my life, I wish I could live again and again and again.
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Beautiful. I love all your poems, because you write them so well, but this is one of my favorites.
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BAD BILL THE POET'S YER ONLY MAN!
Yes, compact and high-impact, as only you can do, Bill.
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Incredible...
Dear Poet...not a superfluous within nor another needed...it's a compact-high-impact piece of poetry...you take a photograph and show the reader a film noire...sentient sentiment...we try to freeze frame happiness and in time it may in turn haunt us...tangible evidence of memories...I wonder whether the Native American Indian belief that they used to hold that photographs capture part of the soul is true...my mind goes to the documentry I watched recently re the relevence of the two photo albums made by the Nazi's at Auswhich...a Survivor spoke of the images that were the last sightings of her entire family...friends...neighbours...to see the wizened -prematurely aged faces of the small children...the hollowed souls shepherded towards the gas chambers...the laughing smiley joy on the faces of the female SS guards was hardest of all to understand...ironically these photographs are vital testimony to the barbarity that the Nazi's tried to cover up...the last images Survivors have and also were instrumental in proving that those SS officials that denied any involvement were in fact part and parcel of the process at the death camp...I have meandered across your page somewhat...but the depths of your interpretations of photograph spoke to me...
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A moment past, but we take something of those we love inside...
A friend, nearly 80, showed me a picture of his parents this week. His dad was a proud looking man, whom he resembles a great deal, but his mom's picture was of a beautiful Victorian woman. I could feel her smile in his, and watched the light change and soften his face as he remembered her.
Yes, fleeting things, and ephemeral are photos, not like the essence that becomes part of us in the making.
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Bittersweet beauty. A photograph is a magic thing. The people in the photo could have just been fighting for the kill and the picture will show only that one second that the camera caught. I like this very much and it said a lot.
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Excellent take on the promt Bill. Not all photographs hold happy memories. Some serve to remind us of how quickly time passes...Good luck...mal
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This is a great take on the prompt and you have encapsulated the essence of a photograph well.
All the best in the contest...Sue
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Very nicely written. shows how man kind is allways trying to make them self immortal but in reality everything will fade 1 day.
good luck in the contest
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