Sunday, 7 December 2014

Here, there and everyone

Here and there, now here and now

captured still, in forgotten photographs,

sepia edged mementos of days gone bye.

Dog-eared, brow-beaten, weathered yellow,

passed from pillar to post,

from hand to hand,

by family, by friends, by lovers, by strangers.

The box of photos fell to me

to unravel its mysteries

to trace my ancestry

like a child joining the dots

reveals the tree’s connections.

 

Here a death, there a birth,

a marriage made, a census recorded,

a migration there

and back.

Poverty, cholera and famine

drove the routes travelled,

the roots made,

till finally it was laid to rest with me.

© Sheila Ash, 2014

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