You Have Seen Their Faces
by Melanie Faith
Patricia was
the name
of the imaginary
daughter
to whom photographer
Margaret-Bourke White
and novelist Erskine Caldwell
dedicated
You Have Seen Their Faces.
They were married
from 1939 to 1942,
after their book was birthed
in 1937. Does it matter
which partnership came first? There was
this connection anyway, we might say,
as one imagines them laughing, warmth
between them in their recounting
of young Patsy’s antics:
today she scaled a fence,
yesterday she filched a bicycle pump
to fix her flat rear tire
before pedaling on her own to town.
I have no
imaginary daughter;
no breathing one either.
I have, though, dedicated several
books
although none to the person
I wanted to
at the time; like imaginary
daughters
he proved insubstantial
but like Patricia
no less lovely
a place-marker to visit.
—-
Melanie Faith is a poet, fictionist, photographer, auntie, and professor. Her short stories were published in Red Coyote and SunLit Fiction. Her poetry most-recently appeared in Prometheus Dreaming,,Up North Lit, Meniscus, and in Fredericksburg Literary and Art Review. Her photography recently appeared in Barren Magazine, Fourth & Sycamore, Harbor Review, Sum Journal, and And So Yeah. In 2018, two of her craft books were published: In a Flash!: Writing & Publishing Dynamic Flash Prose and Poetry Power. Photography for Writers was published in December 2019. She is currently working on new poems and photos. Learn more about her latest projects at: https://www.melaniedfaith.com/blog/ and follow her literary and photographic Tweets at https://twitter.com/writer_faith.