I write because I hope these words will pass away from me and ease the pain in my chest. It’s an amazing thing God has created in us; a heartache. There is nothing metaphoric about it. To feel your blood has thickened, and this beating organ has become heavier. But the farther I fall into a self-indulgent pity (not self-pity, but close), the more I see that God isn’t going to let me go on with it. I tell myself it’s not about me. How wrong I am. It is about others, but what will I have to give as a dried up soul? I’ve got nothing to give. Despondency may be good for a writer or musician, but for a photographer its equivalent to having his eyes taped shut. So to hell with this feeling. For as joyful as Kolkata can be, the next time I’m faced with brutality, all I can do is respond in love and continue on with my job here. And that is to show the opposite.
Which is a relentless joy. Last week I met a girl living with her family next to the train tracks who appeared to have been seriously burned. I didn’t ask. Cry if you will, that’s fine. But her smile was bigger than mine ever is. And beautiful. All my worrying, all my thinking, is ashes in God’s breeze. Lord have mercy on me. We count out God because of how terrible the world gets; I’d say count him in because of how relentless love and joy remains.