Posts Tagged ‘Poem’
The Depth That Color Hides
my child is a prize
she adds color to my eyes
and to all my different lives
but the truth of her beauty lies
in the black and white insides
the depth that color hides
and the mother in me cries
as the child in her dies
holding onto prides
knowing she is wise
but still a sadness tries
to prolong the goodbyes
- Sue
This beautiful poem is written by Erica (the model)’s mother, Sue. She was looking at the color version of this image (October 9th) and this one at the same time and without the distraction of color, she notices more how beautiful and thoughtful Erica is in the cyanotype image and hence the poem to describe her thoughts.
As an outsider of this mother and daughter relationship as well as the author of this portrait, I cannot help but wonder the different meanings that this image give to people because of the different social background everyone is at in relation to this image. To me, this image is a part of something greater, it is just a piece of the puzzle; however, to Sue, that is obviously not true.
When I first heard that she wrote a poem because of the image, I was overjoyed. The idea of reinterpretation of images is part of the main reason why I love photography so much. Now, people are expressing their thoughts behind my images and this idea makes me feel like I am going in the right direction.
As I told Sue, “An image without thoughts behind it is just a dead end picture; but with this poem, the image has become a tale that connect the mother to the daughter,the readers to the author and the viewers to the photographer.”
Here is the B&W image to match the poem:
