The Memory Holders

I look at words I typed, years ago.
My mind’s eye calls back the books on my desk,
sharp new scent and glossy paper in one,
mellow crumbling and hand-lettering on back of another,
and the oak outside the window beside the desk,
and the racket outside, the primary school boy
pushing his little brothers up the driveway
in the Barbie Jeep their sister had outgrown,
and the blue and white house dress I was wearing,
the tropical fish stamped on the shower curtain
the avocado-green wall-mounted rotary phone
in the kitchen where we stir-fried vegetables for dinner.
The memory is intact, long gone, and good.
I look at a snapshot taken the same year.
I recognize the faces of the same children
but they never looked like that to me.
First of all the light’s too bright: that shirt,
in real life, had color and pattern, and the Jeep
had shadows of pink decals the boys scrubbed off.
More than that, in real life their mouths didn’t hang open;
their eyes moved and darkened, when they were awake.
They had depth as well as length and width.
They smelled faintly of shampoo and little-kid sweat,
and moved, and breathed, and talked.
Sometimes a snapshot does preserve a moment.
More often it preserves a distraction:
“Stop what you’re doing and come here and pose.”
This picture of the children’s not professional
but still it holds no one particular memory
nor even a collection of similar memories.
Their mother told them to sit still and pose.
The blank generic photo shows the shadows...

I’ve lived my whole life with astigmatism.
I read small print, signs all the way down the block,
and I can sit and play with shape and color
for hours, and enjoy it; but my real life
is lived in texture, sound, and movement.
Sight’s always least reliable of the three
primary senses. Visual art’s diversion
for down time when nothing’s being heard or felt.
I see emotions in facial expressions
if I look at a photo long enough,
but seldom bother in real life, because voices
are so much more reliable and relevant.

Somebody else can save the family pictures.
They disappoint me. I prefer the words.