digital photography has got no soul

form: poem
completed: 11 december 2006
notes: my first attempt at slam poetry; likely a failure

Digital Photography Has Got No Soul
-or-
He’s Just Not That Into You:
A poem, in two acts that are nearly undistinguishable from one another
(which is the intent of the author and not to be questioned or criticized).
Lovingly written in my very own hand on this,
The eleventh day of December,
Two-thousand-and-six
When I should be studying for my exams tomorrow
But have realized that contemporary mathematics doesn’t have a soul either.

*Ahem*

Digital photography has got no soul!
I really wished I would’ve realized that six months ago.
Because I spent all summer standing up for you:
You and those pictures in their two-dollar Wal-Mart frames.
‘Aren’t they gorgeous?
Yes, he is young.
Incredible, isn’t it?’
Daaaaaaamn straight.
I didn’t notice then that their corners were
Blurred
That their subjects were
Stagnant
Even when you did that funky effect thing where you took a shot of someone in motion and PhotoShopped all those crazy lights in.
Whoooo! Trippy!
Isn’t it grand?
There wasn’t any life in them.
There wasn’t any love
Lust
Colour
Creed
Oppression
There wasn’t anything to jump up at you
Get in your face
Grab you by the balls
CALL ME PAPA SMURF!
None of that shit.
Just some flags on the edge of a building
Or a broken-down novelty car
Or – god forbid! – me.
…Not that you ever, ever did that.
You see,
I spent all summer staring at those shots
And finding a meaning that wasn’t there.
I spent all summer pining for you
And promising that nothing would change.
Not for you baby.
Oh, oh, not for you.
Never! Never!
Fuck that shit.
Things change. Things change a lot.
And what I thought was beautiful and artsy and turned me on
Is just an image on my screen.
Your screen. Her screen.
Just something to glance at and think, wow.
He is young.
I wonder what he’ll be doing
Five
Ten
Fifteen years from now.
Something remarkable!
I’m sure.

Digital photography has got no soul:
I wish I would’ve known that six months ago.
I wish I could’ve seen it creep into your eyes as you lay in my bed,
Sated and spent,
Smiling, but only so much,
While I was smiling down to my toes.
I wish I could’ve heard it in your voice
When you told me you loved me as you left my car,
Promising to call as soon as you were up
So we could go fuck before my parents got home.
I wish I could have felt it in your hands
Or your chest or your toes,
Something to give me some clear-cut sign that there was a Dead End straight ahead.
Detour! Short-cut!
I’d turn ‘round if I was you!
Something to tell me that you had bullshitted me for half of a year
And were too much of a chicken-shit to wait it out.
But I didn’t get it and that’s okay.
Because now I know that when you make your daddy’s camera go clicky-click,
You’re not making Art.
And when you super-glue a ball of burnt paper to a stolen canvas,
You’re not really Brilliant.
And when you skin a dead chicken and shove it in a Bell Jar full of formaldehyde,
Then, well, ugh.
Then you’re just one sick fuck.
Because Art isn’t about something that’s pretty
Or perfect
Or weird
Or young.
It’s not about canvases and picking up prints.
It’s not about how long you can go before Squirting Your Spunk Aaaaall Up In That Shit.
Oh, no. None of that.
That’s just you.
And maybe I’m not Hip Enough to get the Point of your Vision.
But I know what I see when I look at art
And, babycakes, I just don’t see much when I look at yours.
So now I know.
Digital photography has got no soul, brother.
At least.
Not.
Yours.