The World Had Gone Still Around Her

She stood on the old bridge as if she’d come there a long way, wind moving her hair, the river turning beneath like some slow and ancient thing. Stones worn by centuries held her without complaint. She leaned over the rail and looked down, not searching, only seeing.

I took the photograph because the world had gone still around her. Because there are moments when a man understands that time is a river with no shore, and the only thing that holds is the light that finds the ones we love.

Maybe that’s all a picture is. A small proof that for one brief breath in this wide and troubled world, grace passed through and we were there to witness it.