Smiles are paralysed senses on the brink of laughter or outright breaking down into saltier and saltier marshes. The mouth, turning up at the face of all that is sad or rather mundane, is really looking to run and take care of itself. Away from your face. That liar in the mirror.
It is said that in cultures that predate sepia as the only available filter for representing angst, that a camera captures your soul. That the person standing at the target end of the lens feels a pull of their essence spirit away at the snap-snap-click-oof.
This is not true. At least not technically of the lore.
What is actually captured is the speaking tones of the inner self wanting to find escape. That call to release in "Cheese" is nothing more than the exorcism of Rudolph Valentino and his many, many names. The teeth bare, the sparkling glint, the crying shame, snapped up in that look back. "Is he smiling? Was she laughing? How long did they really hold those smiles? Is that bloke in the back about to vomit?" The greater the party, the louder the exclamation at the end. It's that collective woot that brings us back to clawing the inner beings from the edge. Another photo intact.
You'll hear it when the group gathers. They'll pause, they'll pose, they'll chitter-chatter all the way to Kettering. The mouths ready to latch onto the escaping breaths looking longingly into the lens.
Inside the meat suit, the inner person sees the that glassy-eye and raises its hands, turning up the corners of your mouth. Smile? No, arms up in despair and raising shackles, tied to the crusty corners of your mouth.
That trick about making yourself laugh to render a more natural type of smile? Falsehoods. The inside is really making a mad dash that tickles you from within and there you are cackling away washing yourself in oil because the water burns.
As such, moreso, when it is begging with all dear life that its hands clench together. One plead, one reach, one duck.
Written on Monday, 21 September 2015