Photo Fit (Poetry)

She has a sweet face —
or had — the photograph is clearly old
and judging from the dress — demure
Victorian — she’s long-since found
a final resting place.

There is a sadness
smudging at the corners of her mouth —
a gentle pain that hollows round the eyes
and I could make a story of those lips
half-open, telling nothing
caught almost by surprise —
as though she wasn’t really ready for the shutter
(was she ready for her death? —
did she sense The Reaper coming?)
one arm still moving, crisp sleeve blurred
a small pale hand held up in protest.

No rings upon her fingers
but a locket at her throat
nothing written and no clue
to who she was
or how she came to be
included here — tucked in among
past generations of my great-great family.

Perhaps she felt she didn’t quite belong —
hence the unsettled look
of the interloper caught
out of place that moment when the camera took
her likeness.

Nothing else revealed —
all dust and paper foxing
from pages left too long unturned
death gradually dissolving loose connections...
Until at last affection feels
her face deserves a fitting name —
some history invented to explain
her being there.

To somehow make her seem more real
and pen a modest legend —
“Lucy Westgate (cousin, twice removed)
August, 1883 ” inked lightly — faded black —
she’d fit with all the others, then
and gaze perhaps
less anxiously.