Camera by Carl Lindquist

photography by Ellsworth Kelly (b. USA), 1970.

Camera

During the latter days
of that long trip
the camera ceased to be
an intermediary lens
that simply sensed and seized
any view it pleased.

Gradually it grew into
an organizing tool
          choosing and composing,
          tidying and trimming,
          dividing, defining, refining
                     shapes and fields,
                     forms and lines,
                     patterns and planes,
                               whether
                                   rough, refined,
                                   fractal, frumpy,
                                   thick, thin,
                                   round, rectangular,
                                   rhomboid, rhombus,
                                   receding, reaching,
                                   choice, chance.

The camera now devises visual dances,
designs that dwell in graceful domains
found in the four sides of the frame.
Rhythmic arrangements
         eclipsing the frame’s simple squareness,
         growing wild,
         sometimes sublime,
         defying distance by grasping
         the universe beyond the peripheries
         of flat surfaces,
         Offering images of travelless travels
                    extending
beyond paper corners and gallery walls,
                    unravelling
from margins and right angles,
                    untangling
from the dictates and demands
of left and right.

The beauty of shapes.

          They first define,
                    and then unwind.

Carl Lindquist

Carl Lindquist lives in India.