Hold Fast

Hold Fast

A photography series by Sarah O'Brien-Hart

At Prescott Park in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, a chain link fence looks out toward the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard. On that fence, someone left a brass turtle. Someone left a brass fish. Others left hearts — engraved, ornate, deliberate — each one chosen.

These were not impulse decisions. Someone found these objects and carried them to this working waterfront, locked them in view of cranes and open water, and left something of themselves behind.

Hold Fast documents that fence — a quiet monument to devotion in a city shaped by the sea. The keys are gone. Whatever was fastened here holds anyway.

All photographs made at Prescott Park, Portsmouth, NH.