She was not a good photographer

Somehow she found a way to make the entire world around her ugly

to capture the sun kissing the sea
is to feel like every trophy in this world deserves to be yours,
to capture an interior without individuals
is to perceive a beauty that's never been told.

to capture the speed of light in busy streets
is to write a thousand thoughts in a minute,
to capture the hidden words in one's countenance
is to reveal the surreptitious lines that are meant to be confessed.

but to be able to capture your heart
is to capture all these things at once.

I have never been to the snowy peaks
Of sitting stones that pierce the clouds
Cutting strange patterns in their
White vaporous forms

I have never boated through the muggy swamps
Deep within the borders of our southern states
Dark marshes that seem to be made of moist jungle green
With camouflaged gators lurking just beneath
Ready to gobble you up

I have never seen the center of an ocean or a sea
Never been lost with only water on the horizon
The only life left to see swimming deep beneath me

I have never walked the tundra
Seeing nothing but winter’s frosty sheet
Awestruck with my dumb luck
But becoming snow blind
Alone with my mind
In a vast white wasteland

I have never and perhaps I never will
For lack of opportunity or depths of fear
But in your photos and words
I have seen this world
What a gift you have given me

So ugly
But it doesn't even bug me

My hair is dated, my clothes are faded
But this photo of me is my favorite

Crooked teeth, eyes begging for sleep
All the things that make this picture complete

My smile is bright
But you should've seen what was glowing in front of me

This is the photo I wasn't even looking
Because I couldn't take my eyes off of the person who took it

We revel in the artist's gaze.
See us, artist, we say.
Scale us in the geometry of your sight.
Objectify us, break us down
To our vital light,
The zero shade of being,
Our essential black and white.

But what if the figure becomes the ground?
Does the artist’s vision ever come to rest?
Does she halt the eye’s restless turning,
Instead hunger to be seen?  Fathomed?  Expressed
In basic hues, simplified, resolved,
Into the object deconstructed, the mystery solved?

Spotlight and camouflage,
Revelation and disguise:
The chiaroscuro of the artist’s eyes.
Then where does beauty reside?
In our eyes, beholders,
Invited in yet held outside?
Or in the starlight, sunlight,
Lamplight as it plays  
On the seer seen in beauty’s gaze?

In an old...
wallet
box
attic
was an old faded photograph of a photographer.
Meant to be...
left alone
put to rest
forgotten
it was since then brought back by nostalgia and the impossible life that was now to be lived without you.
You liked to be...
behind
smiling through
holding the camera
as you were the photographer but not this time, as you were the photographed...
In front of
smiling at
holding a pose
while I became the photographer, photographing you, the freshly captured photographer in the faded photograph.
In an old...
dream
heart
memory
you never faded but remained the still whole of a perfect silhouette.
The perfect photographer preserved in the perfectly faded photograph for...
love
life
forever.

I am not a writer.
I am not good with words,
I cannot speak up for myself,
It is my pen that bleed words.
No amount of convincing can give me conviction.
No amount of clarification can make that distinction.
Please refrain from using titles.

I am not a writer.
I am just a dreamer,
Dreaming dreams of inverted galaxies
Where complexities are reduced to simplicity,
And maybe love wouldn't be so complicated.
I dream of a world where I'll be unchained and liberated,
Because currently freedom is hard to go by.

I am not a writer.
I am just another over thinker,
I stay up all night disassembling the world,
So I can put it back together.
Adding new features that I think will make it better
I get lost in thoughts, and day-mares, fantasies and others,
I obsess and I always suffer.

I am not a writer.
Though sometimes I am photographer,
Snapping,
Close ups and selfies of my terrible mind.
Giving glints of places you won't usually find,
All because I write sometimes.

The Things I Wish I Could Be

I wish I could be
one of all instruments;

the singer whose voice
transforms his audience into a choir;

the writer who drops his reader's guard
making a beautiful decimation of every self-made fantasy;

the actor ripe with nominations
whose prestigious Oscar breaks him open before the world;

the photographer who captures moments worth infinite words
while instilling that perfect piercing silence;

the painter of elegant simplicity
or ponderous complexity in every brush and stroke;

the icon strangers seek for reason
looking upon for inspiration;

the husband who gives and comforts
appreciating the angel he's been bestowed;

the father wise and guiding
with enough laughs and smiles to last their whole lives;

the chef and the baker serving only the best
scrumptious entrees and desserts;

the encyclopedia of experience
answering questions obscured from the web;

yet beyond all things
I wish to greet death with a smile
knowing my life, however lived
was worth those years.