#photographs
Life has passed
me by
in photographs.
One blurrier than
the other.
I see my parents‘
young, rounded faces.
I spend so much
time wasted,
being upset
with them.
I see my
brothers in quilted blankets,
their sweet baby
faces.
My once younger
grandparents
and their crooked
smiles,
with cigarette smoke
in trays.
I get the sense
nothing ever stays
the same.
Nov 28, 2025
Nov 28, 2025 at 2:44 PM UTC
I have worn a diaphanous gown throughout my life.
I did not feel the weight of the delicate gossamer at first, but then objects began to stick to the material.
I did not notice when it gathered trinkets of
moss and leaves.
Then as the years passed, the gown became heavier.
It collected photographs, letters, and other things I thought I had long forgotten.
Oct 18, 2025
Oct 18, 2025 at 9:11 PM UTC
Life is a painting,
From the 1980's.
Just as perfect as it could be,
Just a memory.
I hope I never forget,
The memories,
That are you and me.
Jan 24, 2025
Jan 24, 2025 at 2:34 PM UTC
my old photographs hang
on a wooden frame, found
on the lawn of a house
whose man has no name.
do we still print photographs these days,
or just keep them on our phones?
I don't. We take them, edit them,
and make them into something we can clone.
photographs, something I prize;
the whole journey of discovery,
timings: early morn or sunset,
capturing moments of gratulatory,
but I don't take many now,
why? where has my love escaped?
do I now just capture them with my eyes?
have I hung those dreams too, where my lost hopes are draped?
Dec 19, 2024
Dec 19, 2024 at 4:06 PM UTC
Scents of satsuma and cinnamon
bottled up into reminders of the little things
this blurred motion has created a mirage
of incomprehensible reasons
to forget our love for patience
from strings of silver threads
and sentimental alliances
woven into patterns of picture frames
completely blurred, alive in motion
together, a collage of all the times
stillness couldn't find its breath
and laughter took us by the shoulders
shaking and shaking
till we fell into a rhythm of remembrance
with all the little things
bottled up in an illusion of permanence
Feb 17, 2024
Feb 17, 2024 at 3:27 PM UTC
Birds always fly south
When, a winner has a moment...
Sour old fall, of life into bed with a crowd
Of feelings; never a spoil or relent?
Acceptation and divorce, artily
A shrewd person knows more than a cup of tea?
Lights and party's, fights and smarty...
When a dalliance has the floor, a candor can be...
Hair is a smile, if first and foremost denial?
Simply airs, and the deified soul to prove...
A habit in the gray, hosts of decency known a while
You are the hero, I am the pact and the silence of love...
A wager in the shadow of a waterfall?
Since rainbows are so expensive, or a mutual cause...
Where is a life more naked, with terror or mercy for a salt?
The price of love has become even more, a sit with laws...
Knowing what I do, a reason has a voice to win every argument
Spill of light, or cover of darkness...
The tooth you share, is a peace with a realm to its redoubt, patience?
Has the time to remember me; when shame has become a seen, bless...
Sleep or sunshine, the dream is the same...
Sport of since, and the charity of a simpler sake
My moment in the borrowing of still, has come and gone with fame
Of a new time, in the shared forces of wishes, we've come to hate or make?
Oct 30, 2023
Oct 30, 2023 at 6:07 PM UTC
photographs are a comfort
the reliving memories of
joy
sadness
accomplishments
including accidental
some can be relived more than others
and
more than often
I tired to remember your laughter,
all that was left is an impressionable smile
that hid all your numbing pain.
you left this planet and I stayed in frequent admiration of you.
Jan 6, 2023
Jan 6, 2023 at 9:40 AM UTC
Once upon, what "is"
Has no "never be's"
Pictures, now, are strange to me
A snapshot back to a certain future
Laughter shared; tears, too
It precedes my doubtful memory
Pictures, now, are strange to me
Once upon, what "is"
Lives indefinitely
Unaware of what will never be
Pictures, now, are strange to me
Printed pieces of boundless time
Whose citizens are full of life,
Safe from looming trajedies
Pictures, now, are strange to me
Once upon, who "is"
Are now all ghosts
Free, from framed captivity
Pictures, now, are strange to me
Jan 2, 2022
Jan 2, 2022 at 1:46 AM UTC
Like the short-lived sunrise
My window refuses to show balloon,
I pass jarring time that pours
Looking at pictures in accompanied laughter...
Like a candytuft dies
My soul flourished a dancer in tune
To a touching sound that tours
Around an imaged and gaily passed chapter...
Jun 12, 2021
Jun 12, 2021 at 3:52 PM UTC
Gazing at your different faces
in my pile of photographs.
Remembering the rhymes
I used to carve in those smiles.
Reliving the affection and delight
I used to see
in those luminous eyes.
These words I tried to write
for this unfinished poem,
With my heart in fragments
and my soul cut open and torn,
I will now have to say goodbye.
For you have willed that tiny hope into stillness,
And with the flame I long adored
started to flicker,
These last lines
I needed to pen in bitter darkness,
“Goodbye, my love.
Please take with you
the memories of me!”
May 18, 2021
May 18, 2021 at 2:30 PM UTC
She's posted a picture of her son,
Sitting on a swing I assume is moving.
I wonder how this Spring day moves him.
The sun stretching
From his head to his toes,
As he arcs to and fro.
I'll never know.
It's a picture of her son.
Does he read, write, paint, build?
I'd like to see his photography.
Perhaps a picture of his mother
Sitting on a swing;
But it's him, sitting there, still.
May 14, 2021
May 14, 2021 at 8:19 AM UTC
Once, long ago
A brilliant flash before
Saved forever in time
Faded in shades of greys
Like a photograph;
Black and white
One thing or another
Not shining in its entirety quite yet
Then, saturation of color and hue
Bring forth visions unseen
Slightly blurred at first,
Then in full detail
Sprawled out into glorious view
Though once, only raw and bare
Time brings it into exposure
Into the open air
Believe it or not
Some brought into the light of reality
As they are surely meant to be
- Jay M
April 19th, 2021
Apr 19, 2021
Apr 19, 2021 at 2:21 PM UTC
Kung hindi ngayon kailan?
hanggang kailan mapipigilan
malikmata sa abang isipan?
Lumulobog nga ba
o sadyang pasikat pa
lang ang araw Kong nagigisnan?
Hanggang saan pa ba
ang kayang tanawin ng inyong kalooban?
'gang sa likod ba ng mga lilang
ulap at mala-kahel na papawirin?
Tulad rin ba niya ang inyong mga mata na mayroong tanglaw at panglaw?
Sa kung gaano kalalim ang lawak ng karagatan sa taglay nitong saklaw?
Kung kayo ang nasa katayuan ng namamasdan **** katauhan..
Mababatid ninyo kaya kung paano niya
minamalas ang nasa kanyang harapan?
Sa pakiwari ko'y hindi sapagkat talos kong nadaramang higit ng inyong mga puso...
Na ang nilikhang inyong nakikita ay walang nakikita sa malayong ibayo !
Hindi dahil sa siya ay naiinip lang na makita na ang kanyang minamahal..
Ang tutoo nangangamba na ako na baka hindi na niya maantay ang resulta ng aking pagpapagal.
Sapagkat kung ano man ang nilalarawan ng bawat kapaligiran..
Pikit mata ko na ipinipinta ang mga sandali kung paano ko siya daratnan !
Kaya ngayon na ang tamang oras
At di ko na kaya na ipagpabukas
upang sabihin sa kanya na hindi na ako mamamalakaya.
Mahal heto na ako sa iyong likuran..
'Wala akong hilang sagwan',
Ang bulong ko sa aking isipan..
Tatakpan ko ang iyong mga matang namamalakaya
Hanggang sa ang aninag mo muling maging malaya..
Dahil ang araw na ito ay hindi takipsilim para sa ating dalawa
Bagkos ang liwanag nating inaasam ay binibigay na ng bukang-liwayway !!!
Ngunit mga katoto kung ang sagot ninyo ay Oo..
Marahil inyo nang napag-isipan mga binibini at mga ginoo
"... Na kung minsan bago pa tayo may mapagmasdan
Madalas hindi agad namamasid ang lihim na kagandahan"
Bihira man bigkasin ang kasabihang...
" magkaiba yung may tinitingnan
sa mayroong tinititigan "
Nov 1, 2020
Nov 1, 2020 at 8:07 AM UTC
I pondered the thought of insanity
Taking the time to weigh it all up
Feeling the pressure of all consequence
Should I slip up
I began to sift through old recordings
Stashed away in the hope of amnesia
I dusted them off, anticipating
But ready to begin
For in those broken hours formed a lady
Designed by an autistic artist
Those flaws seemed so beautifully *****
Bringing flowers and gifts to her room
I recognised her face in the photograph
Much more dusty than ever before
For the life of me I could not remember her name
She was gorgeous
I endeavoured to find out her meaning
Her purpose, her lifestyle, her goals
In reality, she never knew me
Oh, but I knew her!
Scratching below layer upon layer
Stumbling numb towards truth
Wanting so much, all those flowers
And gifts in her room
For in those broken hours formed a lady
A woman romantically perfumed
Weaving in and out of insanity
Yet, always in truth
Oct 4, 2020
Oct 4, 2020 at 2:39 AM UTC
#*Misty waterfalls
And mud trails
Mountains covered in green
Like the meadows
As you climb up the top
You savour corn on the cob
Roasted on charcoal
A zing of lemon, butter and herbs
While taking in the view of the valley down
Moments to minutes, gentle hours
Memories in old photographs*#
Jul 16, 2020
Jul 16, 2020 at 12:17 AM UTC
⚠Trigger Warning: the following poem contains religious allusions that some might find offensive⚠
Memories belittled by dust,
preserved, taxidermal fashion
inside an anthology
of vintage photographs.
Though,
I am aware that
"vintage"
is only a euphemism
for a possession
that was once beautiful.
Your treason
has turned all the photographs
ugly,
their corners curling up
like the spiral of a chameleon's tail.
Vivacious colours devolve
into lacklustre,
sepia tones,
blending in with
the palette of my
surrounding melancholy.
Ensnared in a dilemma:
Do I miss you?
or
Do I hate you?
(perhaps a bit of both,
but never
I love you--
not anymore.)
Apertures mewl,
bruising the gallery walls
with tears.
I frame your
betrayals
with gold and
garlands of daisies
in an attempt to soften
our past
(it never works).
These
vacant
hallways
trap your phantom footprints
beneath the cobblestone.
Was it really
such a guiltless task
to walk away from me?
Embedded
across the rungs of my spine
are the scuff marks
from where you wiped the dirt
off your boots only after
wrenching the welcome mat
from underneath me.
I have accepted that
our friendship was
merely transactional
to you;
I served up
all the love I had to
give
like John the Baptist's head
was served up upon a silver platter.
You feasted
while
I starved.
Yet,
full is this menagerie
of lost things.
I know
I should burn
the polaroids
in the name of closure.
Perhaps
I am just afraid there will be no art--
no poetry--
left to sculpt
from the cinders that
remain.
Apr 23, 2020
Apr 23, 2020 at 9:12 PM UTC
Photographs
by Michael R. Burch
Here are the effects of a life
and they might tell us a tale
(if only we had time to listen)
of how each imperiled tear would glisten,
remembered as brightness in her eyes,
and how each dawn’s dramatic skies
could never match such pale azure.
Like dreams of her, these ghosts endure
and they tell us a tale of impatient glory . . .
till a line appears—a trace of worry?—
or the wayward track of a wandering smile
which even now can charm, beguile?
We might find good cause to wonder
as we see her pause (to frown?, to ponder?):
what vexed her in her loveliness . . .
what weight, what crushing heaviness
turned her auburn hair a frazzled gray,
and stole her youth before her day?
We might ask ourselves: did Time devour
the passion with the ravaged flower?
But here and there a smile will bloom
to light the leaden, shadowed gloom
that always seems to linger near . . .
And here we find a single tear:
it shimmers like translucent dew
and tells us Anguish touched her too,
and did not spare her for her hair's
burnt copper, or her eyes' soft hue.
Published in Tucumcari Literary Review (the first poem in its issue). Keywords/Tags: photos, photographs, pictures, album, keepsakes, mementos, ghosts, phantoms, past, memories, recollections, tears, grief, anguish, glory
Apr 11, 2020
Apr 11, 2020 at 1:34 AM UTC
Album
by Michael R. Burch
I caress them—trapped in brittle cellophane—
and I see how young they were, and how unwise;
and I remember their first flight—an old prop plane,
their blissful arc through alien blue skies ...
And I touch them here through leaves which—tattered, frayed—
are also wings, but wings that never flew:
like Nabokov’s wings—pinned, held. Here, time delayed,
their features never merged, remaining two ...
And Grief, which lurked unseen beyond the lens
or in shadows where It crept on furtive claws
as It scritched Its way into their hearts, depends
on sorrows such as theirs, and works Its jaws ...
and slavers for Its meat—those young, unwise,
who naively dare to dream, yet fail to see
how, lumbering sunward, Hope, ungainly, flies,
clutching to Her ruffled breast what must not be.
Keywords/Tags: album, photos, photographs, pictures, mementos, keepsakes, cellophane, yellowed, leaves, pinned, held, imprisoned, time, delayed
Apr 1, 2020
Apr 1, 2020 at 5:27 AM UTC
I guess I wanted you more,
that's why I let you hurt me the way you did.
Tore me down till I was worthless,
But in the pictures you don't see the tears I shed
The photos taken between tear stained nights
will never show the way you hurt me so.
I guess I wanted you more,
as I tried to overlook the way you spoke to me.
Degrading and demeaning - never worthy of your time.
But when I look back at our memories
no-one could have seen the way I was dying inside
Because these pictures are so good at hiding all the hurt!
I guess I wanted you more,
By the way I fought for you through all the pain.
Maybe it was a moment of weakness,
But I hated myself more with you, then on my own.
So while I fight for my freedom
At least now I know, I don't need you!
I don't need you anymore!
Jan 30, 2020
Jan 30, 2020 at 1:52 PM UTC
I left photograph albums of her out on
the coffee table
Thinking the neighbours might like to
see and so, celebrate her life
Her youthful days spent at home,
playing among the fields, by the river,
In the little country village where she
lived,
Her time in England and in America,
Her joys, her loves, her hopes,
I thought it was a good idea.
But when the neighbours came by
They talked only of their own families,
their kids
About their hobbies and what Clubs
they were in & what they were doing
the weekend,
About their cars and how big they
were
What horsepower the engine was,
They talked of Life and of getting on
with life
And enjoying life,
Maybe they had it right, trying to be
positive in the face of sorrow
It must have been awkward for them,
Maybe it was my own fault too, for not
drawing their attention to them (the
photograph albums)
But I was busy getting drinks, making
sandwiches, serving tea
(And had a fair bit of drink taken
myself by then)
But the photograph albums they were
left their untouched, not a single page
was turned like no one was interested
Like no one wanted to know, like no
one cared at all
I thought it kind of sad, and my Dad
who had sat there silently for a long
time
Listening to what was being said
Suddenly got up and walked out in a
bit of a huff.
We needed a suit of clothes to lay her
out in, in the coffin,
I thought rather foolishly I suppose,
that I should put them on the
radiator first to warm them
It would be cold in that coffin, and colder still down in that deep dark
clay.
In the Nursing Home she had
complained of being very hot
I used to take her in a little tub of ice
cream
And give her a few teaspoons every
night,
Now when I open the freezer door,
there's still one tub left inside
The last one, the final one I'd brought
in
But never used, that same fateful night
she died.
It's funny but I try not to think of her
that much
Because I know if I did, it'd only upset
me, make me all sad & teary eyed
And I'd be no good then, no use to
anyone,
There's a time and a place I suppose, a
time and a place to grieve... to
remember.
I know she wouldn't have liked to see
me that way either,
She would have wanted me to get on
with my own life
She used tell me, "Don't waste your
time on me, my life is over now,
my days are done,
It's your turn now, go live your own
life and find your own happiness".
It only hits you when you go into her
room & see her clothes still hanging
there
And you realize she's not around
anymore to wear them,
I bought a lot of them for her myself
Used to embarrass me going into the
Ladies Section to get her stuff
The pyjamas, their the saddest, they
hurt the most
The ones with the little woolly sheep
on them, the ones with the nice
bunnies
( Heh! they always used to joke I had
such poor taste)
The one with the bright red flowers
And the one with the little penguins
on skis
With the scarves wrapped around
their necks.
We had to write a final farewell
message to put on a card
To go on the bouquet on her coffin
I struggled at first, looking over at my
brothers, not knowing what to say,
My mind, as always, wanted to say the
'right' thing
But luckily, my heart got in the way
I said, I wrote " Thanks for all the
Years Mom,
It was a great pleasure knowing you,
Enjoy the next life, you deserve to,
I'll be seeing you! "
Sep 22, 2019
Sep 22, 2019 at 7:48 PM UTC
I spent hours picking a dress,
Because it is a big deal to look good for pictures with friends,
I got up early just to do my hair really curly,
For the only fest that comes once a year,
You all made memories,
You all took pictures,
You didn't ask me to join,
Uh oh,I thought you were my friend,
You probably didn't notice me holding other's bags,
I didn't feel like asking,
I didn't want my friendship forced on you,
If you really want something, you'll go all the way to get it,
Sorry I got my hopes up.
Aug 31, 2019
Aug 31, 2019 at 2:37 AM UTC
and you were just there
sitting at the corner of my cabinet
in a box
full of photographs
wrapped in cinders
trapped inside are the memories
that will forever be treasured
Aug 16, 2019
Aug 16, 2019 at 8:58 AM UTC
is this how we fix bad photographs?
saturate the focus, craft the perfect banner,
grain enough to feel the gloom
in between the curved lines.
then before our eyes -- perfection
of disgust & delight
if so, then i am just a bunch of
bad photographs
loading
unloading
still
load
- ing
to be curated, and
to create its own color corrections.
Jun 6, 2019
Jun 6, 2019 at 10:20 PM UTC