Letter to the Angels, Poland, 1919
Psalm 74.14—Leviathan appears as multi-headed sea serpent
My beard is scraggly clothes hanging on my skeleton but
I speak not for myself
We were never asked to empty our homes instead we treble-key birdcage howl
sparrows scattering lime trees lined up
We left river Stryi’s platinum surface
speaking narishkeit like not heeding a rabbi’s sermon
The river would never empty itself we would never
empty willingness measured out
Two children gone ahead
Mary, Harry, letters sent no reply so I write postcards to you, dear Angels
Nothing to eat no work the Spanish flu Tobe lost
I implore you
Now in Bolsqowce we surrender our autograph books
friends signatures to remember us we empty viola notes clang cookpots
as we pack
I’m trying to understand a self-emptying
We direct conversation your way
complain of in-laws small matters
Are you
good angel bad angel
Now in Tarnów, we head overland
then into the purple sea a seven-headed sea serpent
twist turn coil we cannot control
visions aboard ship a man swallowed
Your instructions for arrival in Amerika
arrange a new house the same pattern arrange the eyes
arrange ourselves
into tablecloth lamp settee
chanting no longer hidden we become Americans forego
strict observance do not drape the head with a shawl
We still need you, good Angel
We
lost the photo self-colorized fell into the ocean
the serpent’s mouth You cannot return
photo acid-washed
red blood of plankton
~
The Ghost of My Grandmother, with Clouds
i.
She visited my childhood room nightly, billowing clouds. Sleeves
left a vapor trail and sometimes in the guise of a deer
licked my hand, her tongue warm.
Dust settled,
a dim moon translated Yiddish, the round parts half sentences—
Death accidental— (like my mother said)
ii.
Your grandmother? Your husband? The doctor in few words. As if
cancer could be procured by association a paper gown.
My grandmother at 47 had no technology to vision
the growth— a deer’s fur rubbed in the wrong direction, prey
to the hunter.
No, I couldn’t wait another year—
watched the video, signed the form, tied the floor-length cloth gown.
Woke in a daze (or thought I woke)
next to my husband, a walking dream, meeting a tortoiseshell cat,
rough coat, milky eyes. A woman popping out of an RV.,
She’s lived all her lives.
The woman’s wrinkled hands took our hands.
I channel St. Francis. Sent us away with a postcard of angels.
iii.
What is waking? I woke up glowing. Should have run
when my husband, yes my husband was diagnosed
with the same cancer as my grandmother or what is it to promise
yourself to someone
based on tragedy like soldiers
and the women who marry them.
iv.
The ghost of me made it past his surgery
then a three week trip to England hiking around a lake
ripples of a duck paddling.
I ran
along the trail, towering peak behind, tagging trees
like my brother and I on long family hikes, saying,
You’re it.
Lichen attached to my hands I pictured the doctor
who refused to take me seriously,
an already-ghost
couldn’t see the ghost of my grandmother or hear
her voice,
tempered by time. If a woman left one town
for another to escape Jew-burning—
she ran
Wouldn’t she advise
and wouldn’t you listen when she appeared
bedside, speaking beyond the grave?
v.
(Now, I imagine grandmother’s death a kind of sacrifice,
hard Flatbush streets an exchange
for those struck down in Poland, in Galicia, in Ruthenia, country lines
changing.
But I know it doesn’t work that way.
She could not save her cousin, bullet
to the head, pogrom in Styri like others
who would not burn.)
vi.
At some point (maybe age twelve) I asked my grandmother,
Don’t come back.
My bones were growing and I
could barely fit in the cot-sized bed, flesh just one incarnation
of who I’d become.
Her round face shook and her short dark hair—
the velvet deer sleeves
she only wore for special occasions
formed a face with a nose and twinkling eyes.
She offered a ring. Gold.
It wouldn’t fit—ghosts are broken,
shadow inside rain inside breath.
~
Shlufulah
My mother overturned laws wearing shoes too tight,
and at night her—Shlufalah—unhinged
tremors ever so gently, from a past when she knew
nothing of sycophants in the openings
of the world, clay sculpture dreams
where—Shlufalah—her mother tucked
sheets to keep out the draft, shut out the mechanic
down the street twisting metal, sounding like dust
settling on the north pole—Shlufalah—
the only way to anchor a babe, hand-molded
mountains, illumination of perfect
syllables—and my own Shlufalah—sea shifting
bedrock, the sea whispering, my mother’s lips
feathers fluffed, for Shlufalah—
swagger of sleep forming at the corners,
that I could inherit Shlufalah from my mother,
holding faith in her palm.
~
The Art of Persuasion
Do not imagine, Esther, that of all the Jews in the kingdom you alone will be safe.—Mardochaeus, Apocrypha
i.
Toothbrush in little hands half-filled with paste, back and forth
as the girl’s mother scolds, Esther, you know better,
remember to share.
Campground bathroom mirror reflects mother and daughter,
eyes sideways, long auburn hair—I do not ask about the ends waving
like grasses close to the river. I do not ask,
Campground Esther, what spell have you cast this time?
As a girl, I fell in love with Bible Esther,
where each curve of her cheek stood against injustice,
where she saved Persian Jews from a pogrom.
Will Campground Esther escape punishment like her namesake?
ii.
I’m twelve years old at the temple Purim bazaar, hamantaschen dough folds
revealing poppyseed, prune, or apricot filling, like stained glass,
the cookie type, not as good, my mother says,
preferring the sweetless dough made in our kitchen.
She buys me a L’Chai pendant, tells me it means Life.
My brother and I run the length of the hallway. Fingering the pendant,
I realize I’m old enough for life, which is adulthood, isn’t it?
iii.
In the campground bathroom, tall pointed windows let in the redwoods,
when bird calls begin—
the dripping bird, we named it, like a faucet, and another, high-pitched echo
of the marbled murrelet, belonging to the ocean but married old growth,
upper stories nest-laden.
I’m waiting for the one sink with warm water,
to open pores, saturate with cleanser. Wait for the foam of conversation
to simmer.
iv.
What Esther and her mother don’t know—in my campsite I’m tangled in blame
for a nephew’s relationship fail. Such nonsense.
My husband: your communication style is different.
(What he believes: why does she have to be the bird
who doesn’t belong.)
I imagine others unmasked for their plots to murder, like Bible Esther’s
cunning villain. A story where God is not mentioned.
I don’t want to hide my identity, say I’m Jewish, a scapegoat.
I will not be made invisible.
v.
Esther places her toothbrush on the sink edge, hand resting
on the immalleable surface. You’re right, Mama. I’ll apologize to her.
Her face cinematic shifts from toil to dreams, nights filled with simple
patterned daisies. She is the froth of hot chocolate when people emerge
from tents like bears from the lair.
There’s something fixed about the scene, mother’s instructions,
yet does anyone know how a girl will respond? Maybe
she’ll return to her campsite, share her bike with her cousin.
She will learn in reflection,
lead us through the diaspora.
~
My Soul Blossom in Your Blood
—after the photo of Mistislav Rostropovitsch playing cello at Checkpoint Charlie, November 11, 1989, when the Berlin Wall came down. Taken by Sgt L. Emmett Lewis Jr.
I’ve been told, Don’t over prune,
don’t over water. I’m stumbling
on high heels, then trying
to eat breakfast, but it’s a bowl
of blood. I take another breath,
then start over. This time
it’s tangerines, heavy, thumping,
ticking like a camera shutter.
Did I hurl too many insults,
a learned tactic to dismember
the enemy’s vocal chords? Mine
have broken. A man plays cello
at the border crossing, children
looking on who have hidden for years
among those who would keep them
after their parents were taken.
After their parents were taken,
among those who would keep them,
looking on, hidden for years
at the border crossing, children
have broken. A man plays cello
to the enemy’s vocal chords. Mine
a learned tactic to dismember—
did I hurl too many insults,
ticking like a camera shutter?
It’s tangerines, heavy, thumping,
a starting over. This time
blood. I take another breath
to eat breakfast, but it’s a bowl
on high heels. Then try again,
don’t over water. I’m stumbling.
I’ve been told, Don’t over prune.
~
Pigment Into a Wound
Perhaps the country wasn’t ready, tormented
before the holy book
was written, shammash on hand
to bury the dead.
She’d had enough of the temple’s halakha
dividing her from men, enough of border towns
invaded. Worried
she’d given her children
too much or not enough, or that fasting
wasn’t enough
or what about the thin curtains
she’d hoped to replace.
She continued to apply deep red lipstick,
the only makeup she believed in
because belief, the exacting color
left by her ancestors
when revelation was in short supply,
moated her hunger.
Above a gorge, wild cypress
clinging to a granite shelf,
a splintered cedar cried out,
no one a witness—
When the sky
missiled into her,
her eyes froze, reading
the words behind the text—
This is the path
re-written in haste.
__________
Laurel Benjamin’s debut book Flowers on a Train is forthcoming from Sheila-Na-Gig Editions. Her work appears in Of The Book Literary Journal, Pirene’s Fountain, Lily Poetry Review, Cider Press Review, Taos Journal of Poetry, Mom Egg Review, Gone Lawn, Nixes Mate. She received an Honorable Mention for the Ruben Rose Memorial Poetry Competition. Laurel holds an MFA from Mills College. She invented a secret language with her brother.