Conjure

I try to picture my mother,
close the eyes trying to have her appear
and she almost does, the hair, eyes
but never complete,
that blanket pulled over memory
and I look at a photo,
yes, I had the hair right
but not the depth, the wisdom,
the painting of one
I knew so well.
 
Perhaps a safeguard, remember,
but not quite, that person who influenced
what you are today.
 
She was real, wasn't she?
 
The picture says yes.

Edward Rochester Esq.

On Thursday, March 23, 2023 at 10:38:55 PM UTC, Edward Rochester Esq. wrote:
> Conjure
>
> I try to picture my mother,
> close the eyes trying to have her appear
> and she almost does, the hair, eyes
> but never complete,
> that blanket pulled over memory
> and I look at a photo,
> yes, I had the hair right
> but not the depth, the wisdom,
> the painting of one
> I knew so well.
>
> Perhaps a safeguard, remember,
> but not quite, that person who influenced
> what you are today.
>
> She was real, wasn't she?
>
> The picture says yes.
>
> Edward Rochester Esq.

We are all, eventually, just memories.

On Thursday, March 23, 2023 at 6:38:55 PM UTC-4, Edward Rochester Esq. wrote:
> Conjure
>
> I try to picture my mother,
> close [my] eyes trying to have her appear
> and she almost does, the hair, eyes
> but never complete,
> that blanket pulled over memory
> and I look at a photo,
> yes, I had the hair right
> but not the depth, the wisdom,
> the painting of one
> I knew so well.
>
> Perhaps [it is] a safeguard[;] remember,
> but not quite, that person who influenced
> [who] you are today.
>
> She was real, wasn't she?
>
> The picture says yes.
>
> Edward Rochester Esq.

A few corrections/suggestions are shown in brackets above.

The final line is unnecessary, but it doesn't hurt the poem.

I love the question in the penultimate line (which is why I would end it with it). The final line, appears (at least superficially) to answer the question, confirming her existence; which could cause a careless reading to considered it finished, and move on without giving it the consideration it deserves.

OTOH, its inclusion doesn't hurt the poem, because a more careful reader will realize that the fact that "the picture says yes" isn't the pat answer that it seems, but is actually indicative of the speaker's questioning the reliability of the photograph.

Perhaps rephrasing it so that it doesn't seem like such a pat answer would be best.

Either way, the question of whether someone from the one's past actually existed is a good one -- and one on which one could have endless philosophical debates.

As a Schopenhauerian, I believe that each moment came into existence with its own past. Whether that past actually happened of not is of no consequence to the "present" moment. It is exactly what your poem presents it as: a not-quite-perfect memory of something which we remember as our past, but which we have no way of knowing actually took place.