Silent Film

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Across my TV screen they danced,
these black and white images, greasepainted angels, 
people who lived and dreamed illustrious dreams
long ago, now dead and lost to history
like coins lost in tall grass.
I knew they were all dead, certainly the ones I was sure
of and the nameless faces I did not know.
This was a film now starring dead men and women.
These were corpses brought to life by celluloid like Lazarus, out of a
cave of forgotten years.
Charlie Chaplin, Marie Dressler, Chester Conklin,
Mabel Normand, Mack Swain, and the extras
in the other scenes who no one, save the angels,
will ever know.
1914, and they had the energy of active volcanoes,
emotions hot as comets under the greasepaint.
In 1914 they thought mortality was a birthright.

Across my screen they danced, shadowy and lovely.
Silence was their medium, and
silent they are in our memories. They no longer speak to us, entertain us.
Who remembers these dazzling dead ones?
Who will remember me, who will remember you?


© Lamont Palmer

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