Poem: Snapshots Filed

That stranger passing spent 25 years becoming a corner of my peripheral vision.

Snapshots Filed These streets I walk and walk again, each time more deeply lost in a constant unveiling of my days And half the time I’m purposeless and wandering Wondering as well, lenses all set at infinity, finding imagery in stranger’s faces, shot quickly in repose Their unknown, complicated lives, all lived to now, to serve as background to the camera of my mind And me to theirs, together we’re an endless stream, washing across dark glass, exposing pebbles of our human grace, the stories written there in lines on faces, the swift moment of held eyes Then gone, and passed, foreclosing the exposure Freeze-frame one another’s lives, the smiles and tears that brought us here, split-seconded away Young and old and short and tall, reflected in the glass of shops and passing trams, a time-lapse photography of shutter-speeds that push the capability of film--click Sifting bits of language, catching but a half a phrase Mutual unknown lives, developed in scattered images that need to sit a while, over a quiet smoke and coffee Until the print is made, defined, comes clear at last Any face at random, yes the bent woman with a cane Tell me your story--the child gone who never writes, the husband you bring flowers, his rough hands stilled I know you somehow, have known you both before You’d recognize me too, if we could spread the album on our knees, the images that streamed across our lives Somewhere among them, the same faded photo holds us all Another yeah, introduce that young guy with the attitude I’ve lived bits of his life, he may yet live scraps of mine There’s boldness in him, overcoming the hidden fear He’ll miss it all before he’s twenty-two and life’s used up We ought to have a beer and talk about his girl, the one who drives him nuts and makes him sweat and grin But the moment’s gone, another snapshot’s filed away

This poem is included in Jim Freeman's poetry collection CORNER OF MY MIND available here in print or as an e-Book in your favorite formats.