of a great-grandfather or a great-grand-mother,
they stare back at us with our own eyes
our own chins
and maybe the same cheekbones.
They always look somber and stern,
their gaze accusing.
We have no secrets from them
because they have already done
what we will someday do.
They have already been found out,
have mewled their pathetic explanations,
and have already paid the piper.
Sometimes I imagine that the solemnity they project is a mask
as was the severe face I gave my children
when I caught them in some foolish misdeed.
Perhaps, as I did with my children,
the almost-me man in the photograph is laughing on the inside,
unable to prevent my folly
and feeling a bit of rueful sympathy
because of the consequences he knows I will earn.