Camera

A camera is this thing

A box made of metal and plastic

Fitted with mirrors and lenses 

And a hole to consume the light 

It diligently reproduces 

What I tell it to see

The aperture controls the depth

I open the iris wide

In order to make it see less

A thin line of perfect clarity

While everything else

Becomes unimportant

My eyes are lenses and mirrors 

They see an imperfect 

And upside-down world

That my brain then sets right

My mind diligently telling me 

This is the way things should be

You see

I am the opposite of a camera

I have trouble remembering 

The days become a streaming blur

Though daylight fills my windows 

A darkness still persists

The dim creeps in from the edges

like a cancerous vignette

It consumes the light

It becomes hard to focus

And I get this sinking feeling

That I'm out of my depth

Like I'm living in a tunnel

With curved glass on either end

I have trouble looking 

Beyond my eyes

Everything seems so unimportant

The camera sees anything I tell it to

But I'm not really sure 

How to show you 

What this is

That I'm looking at

And I really would like you

To see