theme of the poem a photograph by shirley toulson
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Theme
The poem, The Photograph is about transience of human life, death, and mysteries surroundings them. The poet is looking at the photograph of her mother and missing her. The photograph depicts the scene of her mother’s childhood when she along with her cousins, Betty, Dolly, and uncle had gone to the beach. The uncle had clicked this photograph.
Many years later after the poet was born and grown up into a young lady, her mother and she would look at the photograph; the mother used to laugh at her childhood photograph.
After a few more years, the poet’s mother died. The poet still preserved that photograph. Now she would look at the photograph and miss her mother’s laughter at her own photograph. The poet felt the sea-holiday was her mother’s past; and her mother’s laughter had become her past now.
She also makes mention of man’s transience on the sands of life. When she thinks about all this she becomes miserably quiet with the sadness of separation from her mother.
The photograph is amusingly a dysphoric one. The condition of mother being happy in the photo and the joy of the artist to see her mother in a joyful or happy state both are associated with depressed side.
Incidentally the mother has passed away to see her happy and in the meantime the writer does not have her mother to make the poet herself joyful.
Both are entertaining yet frustrating as the condition of feeling happy and discharged is unnatural. There is a profound loss of discomfort.