Into a Frame

I peer at a reel, a slideshow, into a little frame

A tiny, translucent sheet, a picture of you & me

I dream of togetherness & forgotten fame

What dwelt in my heart before we were “free.”

The reel is wrapped and wound round a wheel

That crudest of instruments we ever did invent

For millennia later, we still neither learn nor heal

But we find we ourselves regret and lament.

My life is like a roll of postage stamps

Unused, unpeeled, unsent, having never traveled

To see waves, platters, paintings, and lamps

I should look at them; the roll unraveled.

It’s rather like the reel of monochrome

Each frame a single day, and one over-slept

With many a time a desire to roam

Each frame is a dead moment gone undeveloped.

Untapped potential in years long left behind

I play out alternate endings & second chances

As long-lost memories resurface within my mind

Of lost friends, times, plays, parties, and dances.

And if I could step into a little frame

May I forever be under your shining gaze

To project your light to an audience you tame

To a family, a culture, whose thoughts you raise.

A slide, a second, a scene in stop-motion

With a background blurred, the highlights sharp, vivid

I stand with flawed recollection and emotion

So when I sit with a frown, think not of me as livid.

Don’t cry; not good for the old film strips

Take care not to get it close to heat or fires

Too much or too little, the struggle tares and rips

Impaling me between other frames, other desires.

I’m tired now of waking and tired of no company

There lies my evening bed: bitter, cold, lonely…

As I recall companionship with few and many

I don’t wish to slumber beside loneliness, nothingness.

The portrait is going blank…