Old Jacket

I took a photograph

of myself once

leaning against a Virginia sweetgum tree.

I fixed the camera to the tripod, 

pressed the button...

commanded the camera so it would go off

only after I had moved around in front

to stand beside the tree 

where I stood waiting.

I remember gazing into the eye of the camera,

gazing into the shiny black eye,

watching, staring, waiting,

and I was caught in time,

hands thrust in pants pockets

and the jacket almost new

when I was forty.

I remember those years since,

now almost twice forty,

sifting through the box of pictures,

coming across it every year or two.

There I am

standing in the jacket,

leaning in the jacket against the sweetgum tree.

Who is it that stands there?

The jacket is in my California closet now,

but I almost never wear it…

collar frayed and faded,

but I pull it on occasionally

and go out wondering

am I the same man, 

the one in the photograph?

Who is this walking still

out the door 

and down the street,

out, out, out,

with my jacket,

his jacket,

the jacket in the photograph

with somebody in it.