N  a  p a  l  m     H  e  a  l  t  h     S  p  a  :     R  e  p  o  r  t     2  0  1  2

 

 

INGRID SWANBERG

 

 

chiaroscuro

 

There is a black and white photo of the four of us gathered within the raising walls of the cedar cabin surrounded by tall lodgepole pines.  We are haloed in sunlight caught by our hair and by my father’s billed work cap.  My father’s left forearm rests on my mother’s right shoulder; his hand drapes a little above dead-center, midair, poised in the ardor of building.  He holds a cigarette down at his side in his other hand, held away from my little brother in front of him.  He is glancing down to me and I am turned facing upwards toward him.  We are both smiling, he with his shy smile of sorrow gladdened by love and I in adoration. My mother’s left hand curves upon my left shoulder and her face glows laughingly toward my father’s. She is wearing her old Marine Corps sweat-shirt, dark red letters on white, with eagle, anchor and globe and the words semper fi.  My brother is shirtless in suspenders and high-waisted jeans.  Perched beside me on the sawhorse in front of them, he is situated just outside the triangle of gazes and looks aside in consternation, perhaps at me, perhaps at no particular thing.