Studying Old Photographs

There’s a photo on my wall, whitetacked there. The grass is golden green and touched by gentle treeshadows that darken it to oilpaint vert. Downy soft, short. The trees offer stippled heads and arms of frothy foliage. Glossy dark leaves like hands climb the odd trunk, here, there. Even now I remember when I took the picture I could hardly breathe; looking on it was like an icepick to the sternum.