William Bibby

WHAT IT WAS LIKE ONCE 
SHOOTING THE NEWS



On Long Parade
         dressed in black like Munch
         on his evening stroll in Oslo
         at Monrad’s Gate,
         a slice of space concealed by the moon,
she took her camera to it
floated her lens across trees,
         fountains.

Across ruins and bunkers
         in a hot city floating her lens
         caught the twilight and shadows;
         her sound man crouched 
         by screaming children
waving away flies
training her shot
          on their delicate mouths.

Filming a mother in the Hebrides;
          washing her hair
          and lighting a fire
          while her husband left
          to sing with the chapel choir.
This is how it was
as she trained her shot
           the celluloid streaming through the gate.

A whole life ribboned with
            the thread reeling
            from each reel
            as events came
            drawn into focus
then to fade a bright world;
opening another can to load
             her hands inside the black-out bag

hearing all the promises explode
              her film dumped
              by the production team
              at the bottom
              of a land-fill site
frame by darkening frame
changing slowly to gelignite.
              That old familiar feeling

of losing something that should have been kept.
               As though missing it again
               was almost a description
               of how life is spent
               trying to find an opening shot
that would mean
finding it deep inside
where we live and do not live but can never decide.