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for my grandfather
by Nancy Shiffrin

This is not about the terrified eyes of the soldier
who pointed his rifle at our plane,
the drive through snowy forests to see empty ski resorts,
nor is it about the young man
who begged me to marry, help him escape.
I was not in Romania to write about you, Zada,
born a country away, buried an ocean away.
What were you doing on the curb, the unbugged sanctuary,
where I sat with guide and driver, argued politics?

Bucharest -- crab apple blossoms dress a gray city.
Assignment:  Report on so-called life-prolonging treatments;
bee pollen, herbal baths, procaine. 
The drug agitates, evokes a sea-voyage, back to Brooklyn,
shul, your hug, delighted chuckle,
when I ran downstairs to davin.
I want to write about Hanukkah, dreidles and latkes,
open the wrong door, find dolls: 
brown Didy cried when squeezed, wet when turned over,
fat Chuckles with bitten fingers, red-haired Toni, wig torn off,
a doll stuck with pins?

I talk incessantly about Romania,
women lined up at barren markets, men playing chess in cafes,
as if I'd never crossed a border or handled foreign currency.
I don't describe locked ghetto gates; elegant, black, wrought iron,
synagogue I couldn't visit, Rabbi unavailable.
Nor do I reveal that you disrupted prayers
in the church where I admired icons.

You whispered about Shakespeare, violin,
studies interrupted by split skulls, splattered tissue,
spoke finally of hiding in luggage bins,
hurricaning onto this alien planet,
sleeping on shop benches with father and brothers,
until mother and sisters had safely arrived.

I miss pastrami lunches at your factory,
machines' thrum, medley of yiddish and Spanish,
wonder at journeys without papers.
I read the Story of Lights to children who have
never starved, or seen someone they love taken away,
smell the Raggedy Baba kept for me,
imagine myself in your lap again.



from THE HOLY LETTERS (poems)
Booksurge.com
copyright 2000

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