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Joan Leotta

Dorothea

 

My husband asks why I do not

Take more photos with people in them

I do not reply aloud

Within my mind I reply,

"because I cannot be like Dorothea Lange".

More fashionable the 

Audacity of Leibovitz and Arbus

For me the epitome of feeling joined with style

Is Dorothea Lange

She captured all of it.

Lately, studying her images,

I realized 

To simply idolize her

To realize the distance between 

My talent and hers does

No homage to her memory

She would want me to 

Take the photos I see

She does not stand by,

ruler in hand, waiting. to rap my knuckles if 

I do not measure up to her vision, insight.

As deeply as she photographed

her subjects in all their starkness

so would she, I think, want me

to make my own art

to be me.

So, 

Click! I've captured you!

Perhaps unlike Dorothea, I 

do not have your soul, 

but I do have the best part

of your essence

that I can see.