HOW HIS SHOES SHINE

HOW HIS SHOES SHINE

Outside, it is
:1835.

A man is having
his shoes shined

at the last tree
before the corner of

Rue de Temple.

He's there at least
a good 15 minutes.

He can see his face
reflected in the toe tip

of his right foot
looking back up at him.

All the other humans
have vanished into smoke

become ghosts
of ghosts.

Anything that moves is lost
in the long exposure.

Daguerre holds
his breath.

Time has a habit of
disappearing.

Daguerre seizes the light
arrests it in its flight.

Nearly 200 years later
the man is still

having his shoes shined.

***

View of the Boulevard du Temple, taken by Daguerre in 1838 in Paris, includes the earliest known photograph of a person. The image shows a busy street, but because the exposure had to continue for four to five minutes the moving traffic is not visible.

At the lower right, however, a man apparently having his boots polished, and the bootblack polishing them, were motionless enough for their images to be captured. There is also what appears to be a young girl looking out of a window at the camera.

“A good snapshot keeps a moment that's gone from running away.” – Eudora Welty