Princes with their beards,
tucked into turbans.
Portraits of ladies,
in fine jewellery,
with books to balance,
the impression.
Native characters,
with dancing bears.
Ashen-thighed men
with chillums.
The Royal Champion crackpots,
with their carcasses.
Nobility,
with their furious brows
and serious stares.
Satisfactory views of
drawing, dining, sitting,
bed rooms, verandahs etc.
showing clearly the arrangement
and detail of furniture.
This man with seven wives
— a father,
looking out of the frame,
against the painted prop,
with a baby on his lap,
assured that,
although babies and children
occasion much trouble,
and require a large
number of plates,
it will be no extra charge.
Mrs. Smalley with an umbrella.
Colonel Keys, Royal Resident,
reliable business-ally.
Nawab Ghalib & Friends,
huddling to hear the first
phonograph recording,
stuffing tubes into their ears.
Ghulam Mahmood & Friends,
with nautch-girls and hooch,
in the studio for a photograph,
for their book of faces.
The heads of all sitters,
cast in the strongest light,
without causing any shadows
in their pictures,
now hung on walls with wheels.
(Impressions of a curated showing of Raja Deen Dayal's photographs at the IGNCA.)
