a photograph

not your father. someone's. the album was sold at the auction of a house whose owner had no descendants. the first page held this photograph. the man is standing in front of a hedge or a wall. he is wearing what looks like a light jacket. he is looking just past the camera.

the emulsion has lifted in three places, taking the face. what remains is a pale figure-shape against a paler ground. you bought the album for the unrelated postcards tucked into the back, and have kept it for this missing face. you do not know his name. there is no inscription.

this is a particular kind of loss: not the photograph itself (you have the card, the caption, the indignity of the lifted emulsion) but everyone who would have known where to look for the rest of him. he is lost as fathers become lost when no one left can place them.