An Everlasting Photo

An old picture appears 
on the screen. Students 
stare at the raw reality.
The professor praises
the photographer’s 
precision and perfection.	
But Kevin is criticized 
at the end as usual.


Kevin creates eternity, 
startles the humanity.
But he forgets to save 
the black girl, blinded 
by a journalistic passion.
Now he smokes, sobs,
repents for the little girl.
He bleeds from blades. 

The African girl hangs 
on his heart’s ridgepole.
He isn’t a predator, for 	
he commits suicide. ‘The
vulture and the little girl’
 was, is, and will be a
reminder of the life lost.



*Kevin Carter is the Pulitzer Prize winning photo journalist, who committed suicide.
First published in The Literary Hatchet (Pear Tree Press, USA)
Copyright © | Year Posted 2019

Poem

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