A Slant of Light

2010 – a long year,
unraveling twenty-six
that ended on the 13th
in December

The afternoon sun came in low through a window and illuminated and made shadows on a wall of objects on a chest in a corner. Christmas decorations sat in temporary place while the chest itself and a lamp and three framed paintings held the scene’s unchanging structure. Through the lens lines were aligned and varied positions were tried to use the light before it faded and the shadows were lost. Four good pictures were stored on the disc. The urgency of the moment passed and the sun faded.

What of these things, when looked at later, became more than the photos themselves? What realization made the images more than the light or the shadows or the objects or the final arrangement of the colored pixels? 

He would take the chest – it was his uncle’s – and one-half of the Christmas decorations. She’d keep the paintings – done by her mother – and the lamp. The walls would be sold.  All the walls would be sold, and the doors and the windows, and the upstairs and the downstairs. The profit, or loss, would be split – 50/50.

What had happened? What made it unravel? A twist of fate? Or a slant of light?