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I Am A Photograph


I furnish your wall
Cushion your years
Fall into me as trapdoors drop

Bringing sounds,
From times forgotten
What happened to them?

Now grey, so crippled
Faces of ghosts
Their imprint in time

It may be difficult because aging isn't a disjointed thing - it's a slow process. But maybe it can work. I don't know. I guess there are landmarks of aging - is that what you're getting at? First grey hair, first wrinkle, first sagging, first time of not being able to run like you used to... Thinka typa. (That's Latin for thinking while typing.)

I haven't read enough. I can't honestly say that I get what you're saying with this one. I like the repeated elements - the trapdoors and how they play against the gates later on. My first instinct was that you were making a joke - calling Elton a her, but I think now that the photo was of a time when Elton & Elvis were both still young and living, but not of the guys themselves. The photo is, I guess, of an unnamed him & her.

It's interesting to have the gates unhinged (which sounds like they're completely removed in the gush) followed by dragging open, which sounds a lot slower. Interesting, but I don't know what's being said.

Byron wrote:I Am A Photograph


I furnish your wall [Just a simple adornment so far]
Cushion the years [Ah, memories, memories...]
Passive [But not for the rest of this piece]


Bringing back sounds, activity [The mind's eye and ear come into play]
Fall into me as trapdoors fall [Daydream and drop into the past that I'll show you] [Falling without effort and without self control as memories come racing up from deep within the mind]
Through times long forgotten [We never forget anything, it just takes a while for all we have known to reappear]

What happened to her? [Faces from the past can be self and/or others]
To him? [Once again can be self and/or others] [The voice is male or female]
Grey, crippled [Those faces of a healthy life now gone are no longer glowing with the verve and vitality of then. Bodies no longer bounce with unhindered exercise]

An imprint in time [Is all that this imagery is]
Elton so young [Way back then]
Elvis soon dead [A pinpoint in time, something like when we remember back to the death of JFK]

Paingates…unhinged [This is personal...Paingate Theory is an accepted phenomenon for the transmission of pain along nerves into the brain, which becomes unhinged after years of constant pain. some gates open while some gates close. If you're lucky they stay closed. Amputees suffer from ghost limb pain for which there is no anaesthetic. Having pain in limbs when there is no actual pain, but the nerves are telling the brain that there is pain and the pain is truly real within the mind] [Trapdoors and gates opening and closing as life takes us along its journey. Any journey takes us to a door, a gate, an entrance, an exit. We seldom see what lies beyond the opening]
Dragging open…[Drag a gate open and hear the grating sound as it jangles on your nerves]
Preparing [The future will be nothing like the healthy past and you'd better get ready for some downsides in your life]

Age [Arrives like the Autumn without hindrance or guile]

Trying to condense so much into so little without losing the rhythm, but wanting to represent the occasional metaphorical jolt was difficult. But you asked good questions and deserved honest answers. I hope my efforts have helped. Thank you.

Hi John ~

I was having some of the same confusions that Manna was with this one; and wasn't sure how to best, specifically express that; so was glad when Manna did.

I appreciate your willingness to accept constructive criticism and to offer your explanations of how, where, why these particular words and references made it to the page. They do bring clarity. I recall your willingness to undefensively do this in the past; was impressed by it then, and am impressed by it now. I can see that you'll continue to refine this to your satisfaction, as well as with awareness and concern for the confusion of an interested reader.

My only immediate comment relates to the repetition of the word "fall" in a single line:
"Fall into me as trapdoors fall"
You're right that what you're trying to do is a difficult task.

That's it for now, John... time to go home. Me, that is .


Love,
Lizzy

Work in progress...now presented..above.

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Hi Byron ~

I remember when we picked apart one of Andrew's poems, about change falling from his war hero uncle's pocket... his herodom unknown to those children. Do you remember that? We were goodwilled in our efforts, yet we still picked it apart like vultures on a carcass. That's how I'm feeling now, as I offer still a few other areas that concern me... but since you're replaced your original, I can't recall whether this alignment was there in the beginning or not.

It's the repetition of the word "time" so soon. Now, perhaps, this is fine, as you change out "forgotten" to "begotten;" yet for me it feels repetitive .

To times forgotten

To times begotten

I might feel differently about it if it were in a song; in a poem, though, they just seem too closely placed to one another.

I also don't feel that the "Elton so young" and "Elvis soon dead" are necessarily working for you.

With the word "Passive," I think I'd be more inclined to say something like "Doing nothing." Of course, they are doing something... they're reminding, but implicitly... so who knows whether my suggestion holds up. Using the word "Passive" in such an outstanding way [a one-word line] at the very beginning of the poem, set me up as a reader to look for the word "Aggressive," or something similar that was going to come into contrast with it, later on in the poem.

Okay. That's enough for now. Since I don't write poetry myself and am not schooled in it, I'm hardly the expert that should be giving specific handling suggestions, so to speak .

You just keep on trooping and that's great .


Love,
Lizzy

Much pruning in the orchard this evening...above.

Oh, geez, Byron... please take this in the way it's intended... a novice's 'bright' ideas . This occurred to me for the first verse, only because that last line was so long and just kinda hung out there, not rhyming with anything.

Believe me when I tell you that if you tell me, "Yeah, Lizzy, thanks; but, for me, that's just too trite... ," I won't be offended and my recourse will only be, "Yeah, Byron, I know... but it rhymes ." That said, here it is:

I furnish your wall
Cushion your years
Fall into me
and allay your fears


For me, that makes the photographs be passive, yet comforting and serving a function beyond cushioning; particularly, as we age. Remembering back when we really did look that way [and no longer do] .

What d'ya think?


~ Lizzy

But the 'fears' stem from visiting the past in the image that we look into. The photograph is a sort of 'time machine' which remains rooted in a moment of our life. The cushion effect is what all photos give to us. Until we take a serious look at them. Yes, I was cushioned by the image, but in truth it has become the elephant in the room. Glance at it and wonder; look at it and be shocked. When we spend years with someone, we don't see the changes taking place. The best example I can think of is when a mother takes her baby boy out in the push-chair. She meets a friend who she has not seen for a few months and the friend says, "My word, he's grown so much, he's twice the size he was when I last saw him." Similarly, we all change but we don't notice the changes for years, or until we look deeply into an old photograph.

The comparativeness of the 'now' and the 'then' is what we could claim to be the 'prime mover' in this piece.

One could say, or is saying, "This is what it was and how wonderful it was, but when it is held up (pun intended) to see against what life is now, I am appalled by the changes which have occurred. They frighten me in their brutal honesty and Truth"

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Don't be concerned about the input you're giving. Writing pieces is the fun part. I sometimes think it's like creating some sort of sculpture. Luckily, if we cut too much away, we can always rebuild it if we want to. Or totally change it. Or leave it for a year or two and come back to it with the perspective of 'time'. And be shocked at the changes since last we read it

Hi Byron ~

I don't have but a minute right now, as I need to get my cat to the vet for her shot, and they close in an hour.

I see what you mean and questioned, myself, my own input. Actually, the way I intended what I said made it redundant... a more direct way of repeating the idea of cushioning. The "cushion" for me was the photograph reassuring us that we aren't necessarily 'just' that shocking figure we see in the mirror now, that can be 'frightening' in comparison to what's preserved in the photograph. That's all the 'physical' and superficial stuff that doesn't really matter... yet, the photographs show us that there really were places at one time where we played without aching. That 'part' of us inside often still feels the same... "I still feel 20 years old inside," or whatever year the person chooses, you hear the comment often... and it does relate to the part of us that never seems to change... that "forever young" part. The photograph is a reminder that this part was actually in sync with the external at one point. With the changes that are still to come , the photograph can be a reminder, too, that this part will remain, no matter how much we are still to appear differently, through all those future changes... so the photograph serves as a future cushion to allay the fears of aging. We are still the same person, deep inside.

Don't know how well I've done in explaining what I'm trying to explain. It was a past/present/future flash I had with the idea of the photograph on the wall. Have you ever experienced looking at a photograph just taken or recently taken and thinking, "Oh, yuk... terrible, not a 'good' one, at all." Then, several [or try 10 ] years later, you look back on that same photograph and wonder, "What was I thinking? That's not bad at all! Wouldn't I like to look that same way now... no complaints!" They're such an odd reminder of our lives and our selves... the photographs.

I'll return later here, John. It's very enjoyable going through this process with you.


Love,
Lizzy