I found him by mistake.
He was under a photograph,
a Civil War tintype rusted by generations
of my mother's womenfolk,
an austere woman wearing a high-necked dress
and a sad brow and tightly reined hair.
She used to be Rose Dawson
so many greats before her name
I cannot count them on my fingers.
I pried her out from under broken glass
and found what she was hiding.
A sad man with pale eyes and slicked hair.
He is nameless and expressionless.
His face reveals as little as his dated suit
with the ruffled neck kissing his muttonchops.
If he is my ancestor, then I think that
some of my blood, too, must have been spilled
on some farmer's field long build upon.
I think a pretty mansion might be resting
on this man's bones, and I think he might be angry
that all we can remember of him is a hidden photo,
clasped in dented brass for generations,
buried under Rose and her sad, sad eyes.
I hope he doesn't mind that now,
in an era he could never dream of,
his memory's only home is around the neck
of a girl who never met him
and will never know his name,
who found him by mistake.