Wedding Photograph.

They’re all dead now, she suspects,
The people in the photograph;
All taken by Death’s scythe
At some unsuspecting moment

Of their lives; the camera
Seemed almost alien to them
Judging by their stare
And look of apprehension there,

None attempts a smile or laugh
She studies the names
On the back of the black
And white photograph,

All are unknown to her,
Although someone
Knew them all
And loved them each

For different reasons
Lost in time’s clutches now.
There is the date, 1908.
Some Jewish wedding

With bride and groom,
Parents and children
And guests from each side,
Each dressed smartly and stiff

For the age and fashion of the time;
Each one having their thoughts
And feelings at the moment caught
By the photographer’s lens and flash.

How each met their end
She does not know for sure,
Though one or more
May have perished

In the Holocaust,
Drawn in by their name
On some Nazi list,
Seeing it was a Jewish wedding

In a Polish place.
She goes from face to face
Trying to communicate,
In mind at least,

With each person
Captured there
With eyes now fixed
In constant stare;

But only silence
Is her gain,
The voices have all been stilled
Or carried off

To some heavenly realm
Of such and such
Beyond her reach
And her ear’s keen touch.