The Weight of Rain

There is a specific silence that follows a long rain. It is not the absence of sound, but the presence of something held back. In the north, we learn to wait for the thaw, watching the grey sky until the horizon dissolves into the earth. We are taught that childhood is a brief season, a flicker of warmth before the frost settles in for good. We look at the faces of the young and we see the history they have not yet lived, the burdens they will eventually carry. It is a strange thing, to witness a smile that does not yet know the shape of the coming winter. We want to protect them from the cold, yet we know that the cold is what defines the hearth. How much of our own past do we see in the eyes of those who have only just begun to look?

Tyler Malone has captured this quiet endurance in his image titled Children of Santa Anita. The rain falls, yet the gaze remains steady. Does the light hold them, or do they hold the light?