Day 7 - "If to see such again"

For today's poem - in light of all the tensions and emotions running high concerning people that I am close to in my family and other relationships because of personal heartbreak, tragedy, or whatever might be the case - I decided to post a work that speaks of those moments in life that take us back to a better place where things were once wonderful and that we never believed would come to an end. And how now, after all things have seemingly changed, we still have the photographs - still moments - of those times left over to haunt us. 'Haunt' might seem an eerie term, but at times I think they really do - not always in a bad way, but they are always there, and they always produce in us a powerful, profound feeling of unachievable distance, yet at the same time we also feel an irremovable, unforgettable familiarity when we are exposed to them once more.

This poem was written when Brittany had been gone for a week for an acting competition and I was left alone and spent much of the time she was away at work or by myself, and all the while somehow drawn to stare at a photograph I have of my parents when they were still together. Most of the photos with both of them together were either destroyed or lost, but I kept this one because, in my heart, it's how I'd always prefer to remember things. My mother, when she saw that I had the photo, said she was "glad" that I had it, in a slightly saddened, solemn tone.

I'll never forget that. And I can never forget those moments, and those times of our lives - like anyone else I'm sure, who has been through similar events. In short, here is my poetic nod to those feelings of ours that beg us to consider the pictures of our lives that will always remain in the albums of our memory.



"If to see such again"


An existence retired, interred in a frame
Without any true form, without any real name
What could one but do, if to see such again
In the flesh, firm and fresh, at that time, all arranged?

Moments true now called false
So remote, reappraised
That old camera’s a felon
Telling lies of that ‘phase’

Though one looks on the thing
And considers its fate
To carry the emotions
Such burdensome weight
Of the ones who have seen it,
And who know what it means,
And who know what’s since happened,
And have lived in-between,
And who’ve loosed all their anger,
And have shed all their tears,
And have wrenched out their story
To whoever might hear.

‘Tis too much for a picture
For one knows such things bear
These lost sights through the years
As we tend here and there
A dear Atlas, bent over
Made to shoulder our pain

Through damp eyes, in dim light
We wonder in vain

Could never
We ever
Smile on such lies again?


- Joshua Clarke