Back
Black on white, a roadside, a shock
of mountain rock: I am looking in
through a photo found in an Indian tin,
to a piece of forgotten history.
There on my father's knee,
my hair cut like Clara Bow,
I can't have been more than three.
Do I remember, or is it a dream
that the group of relations, resting
on stones, are exhausted to mutiny,
while my father continues to
urge us upward? My eyes
look shyly under my fringe
at whatever he wants me to see.
For a moment I imagine his voice:
'The air, taste the air.' And my throat
tightens, searching the square
of a black and white photo,
a band of ghosts, and a
mountain's majestic glare.
by Elaine Feinstein
© Wendy Bardsley 2014
Snowdonia