The photographer stands steady, waiting for the moment to arrive. The breath slows, the finger pounces, a sliver of time is stamped out. The work behind the shutter is done and over, but no trace is left on the negative. The effort channels itself into becoming invisible, leaving only the subject behind.
The filter is dark as a new moon. Twisting and turning, it congeals into a cauldron of ink in front of my eyes, hiding the view and inverting the obscura'd - the camera's hidden depths now extending out into the real world. Nearly blind, the scene in front is reduced to a matter of memory and preparation. An act of faith.
The breath slows but does not stop. Automatically, the lungs fill and compress, fill and compress, fill and compress. Millions of moments of air rush and return, without a conscious thought. Time - slows + down - as light itself, the fabric of the universe, is caught and snagged on the camera's sensor. Less and more than a snapshot the shutter receives an entire breath's worth of existence. A smudge of a memory.
The Sun barely moves in the sky. The path ahead continues. The photographer moves on, taking in new air.
