MY ANCESTOR GRAND MOTHER
I search for you yet do not even know your name
I press on praying my efforts will prove fruitful
the records do not list you or the other women who
have lived and loved and laughed, gave birth, and died,
the records perpetrate the myth that you were never here
but I stand whole and bare my soul
and vow to find you as I live
I search for you in old records, in churches, at the Embassy,
in small dimly lit rooms
in the back of obscure libraries and archives
and pour over barely readable handwritten ledgers
with magnifying glass and flashlight
I live on mainly toast these days
there isn't time for meals or much sleep
feeling as I always do, on the very brink of discovery
Perhaps THIS will be the day I find the one
seemingly insignificant clue, which will lead me to you
although I did not find you listed in the Census Records
I am not deterred, you may turn up yet,
on an Immigration or Naturalization list somewhere perhaps,
or maybe tucked away inside some bank of vital statistics,
long forgotten like so many others,
your name having become lost over the long years
Your name could be lying even now
amidst the millions of documents stored and locked away
safeguarded in the bowels of a giant warehouse
all stopped up from apathetic crowds
who have long ceased their visits
your precious name, lying just inside
a myriad of records packed in tight, packed in to stay
never guessing I would come
@Sarah Elizabeth Rose
srose(a)rosenet.net