‘The dark eye of oblivion’

“I never take them out. I know them too well.

It’s dark in the drawer and common and hidden.

Photos tell you that people can smile at

The dark eye of oblivion. Albums and walls are

Too insistent. What’s part of every fumbling

Morning is closer to the fleeting mark.’’

—       From “My Wife Asks Me Why I Keep Photographs in a Drawer,’’ by Baron Wormser (born 1948), a former Maine poet laureate.