Lines on a Photograph
The wind (there’s always wind
on this headland) flattens the tussock, makes
the sea’s blue bluer even
than your camera could catch it. Still
it’s your best photograph to date.
The tussock’s golden, flattening
to yellow in the wind, sometimes
to brown. It’s like hair.
I’m quite small:
in my red shirt and blue trousers
and what could be a gun in my arms
I’m a small tin soldier standing
in the middle of your photograph.
It’s all I know how to do.
If the wind blows any harder
it’ll take me with it, melting me
into all that blue.
I’m only a part, but I’m at the centre.
Without me it wouldn’t be a photograph.
[WWAM, VUP, 1991]
© The Estate of Iain Lonie 2004 |
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