Under the Red Light
In an imagined darkroom,
a photograph slowly appears.
First the pavement,
then a sleeve,
then the face the shadows
have not quite released.
It would be easy
to name the expression too soon.
A song drawn from world events
must wait at that same edge.
A date can be checked.
A place can be named.
A person's unspoken thoughts
cannot be borrowed
to complete a verse.
The music now has a rendered form.
That is one finished step.
Whether the intended words
survived their passage into sound
still needs listening.
The picture keeps developing.
A pale shape becomes a hand.
What seemed empty
was carrying detail
the first glance missed.
A steady phrase prepares
the next steady phrase,
until one plain word
refuses the rhyme.
Let it refuse.
The fact matters more
than the neatness of its landing.
There may be another rhythm
that can make room
without bending what happened.
Keep the source beside the draft.
Keep the draft beside the sound.
Change what the evidence
gives reason to change.
Under the red light,
the photograph is lifted
by one corner.
Drops fall from its edge.
The face remains partly shaded.
The poem can leave it that way,
without calling the shadow
an answer.
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