Faded

by Tanvi Nagar

cover photo by Anand Saluja, modeled by Anayeli Jaimes

The warm sunshine-

fire from the medallion 

its fiery fangs 

reaching out towards the earth

pouring in through slits of the horizon

where the clouds don’t cover the lands

and the mountain tops don’t reach,

kissed my forehead and tanned my hands

and then bounced off the photograph 

that was held in the clasp of my sweaty palms. 

Its coffee-coloured edges 

tested by the toughest times

and the yellowness set into the frame 

made the faces in the picture seem more alive.

 two girls—hand in hand

their soft faces lit up by sunny smiles

looked directly into the camera

as if staring straight into my eyes. 

Maybe it was a mirror, one of a kind-

for I was able to look into my eyes 

from so many years ago

yet, not fully recognise the little girl 

I saw in the faded photo. 

Amid the smudged background 

and the shoreline of the beach 

I could make out my father’s figure—

admiring his two daughters by the beach. 

My mother behind the lens 

captured this moment into a frame

yet was missing from the shot 

like some of the fleeting passerbys’ hands

who were somehow silhouettes in my past 

and yet, nothing more than that. 

Sitting on the same spot at the beach 

looking at the sun fall into the horizon 

as if simply sliding by into another world 

carrying away the day’s secrets,

and the clouds breaking and crumbling-

colouring the sky with varied hues, 

all whilst my hands held the coarse grains of the sand 

and I paced into the past and ran back as fast 

into the present world of mine.

The gentle wind touched my forehead 

and the water splashed onto my feet 

What if these were the same droplets of water 

that were captured in the photograph?

Maybe, I held the same sand in my hands too.

But the people in the frame—

they couldn’t ever remain preserved in that time.

They were simply remnants of my past and 

just like the photograph in my hands, 

they were blurred, faded, and damaged, 

yet alive—

inside the chambers of my mind.