Dear camera, today we are glaucoma.

Better now to use you in some other way:

paint you for the suffering,

walk you like a broke dog,

give you to the Slav reporter.

 

I cannot hold you any closer, stand

to hear painters tease money from seaside faces:

noose you around another neck,

sink you with stones in your pocket,

cut your lens deep, leave you in the tub.

 

We have seen so much black and white, have toned

and contrasted. I never thought it could get so dark.

I would take you with me

but I cannot see to shoot,

 

cannot wait till milk develops; half clear, half white,

cannot half-watch the while pass.

 

First published in V: An Anthology of International Writing From Edinburgh, 2007.