Camera Obscura 
by John RC Potter

This darkened chamber
that is your heart,
taking these mental pictures
and making love just an art.
 

An image begins to take hold
when this light is reflected,
shadows begin to take shape
as another love is deflected.
 

I am a camera:
a blind unblinking eye on you,
gathering evidence from the prints
in a vain search for just one clue.
 

When you see yourself there
an image then comes to mind
of someone, something, somewhere
and just what you’ve left behind.
 

The vision shifts and settles
inverted, the image takes on a form;
the greatest shadows will appear
across the sky just before a storm.

And yet you are not the mystery
nor is it found in what you do,
it has something to do with me
and my inability to say adieu.
 

Our fates seem to be so intertwined,
we cannot get distance from what we are;
we need to see our love from a camera,
through a shaded aperture, from afar.