Diane Thiel

I like old photographs of relatives in black and white, their faces set like stone. They knew this was serious business. My favorite album is the one that's filled with people none of us can even name. I find the recent ones more difficult. I wonder, now, if anyone remembers how fiercely I refused even to stand beside him for this picture — how I shrank back from his hand and found the other side. Forever now, for future family, we will be framed like this, although no one will wonder at the way we are arranged. No one will ever wonder, since we'll be forever smiling there — our mouths all teeth.