Poems

Bad Wimpfen, Germany When I grasp the rail rubbed smooth over time as I climb the stairs in the house my grandfather built, I spot my mischievous father late for school grinning gliding his mother yelling Schnell! from the kitchen infused with the nutty scent of linseed oil boiling into Read more

Holocaust Archives III_ Love After the Holocaust for Generation 3 Over hopscotch squares It skips. Over pothole maws It hops. Over blue chalk dust Love jumps over us. We Holocaust. We Generation 1, We Generation 2. Then love lands squarely Its lagger falls on you.

Escaping shots Her wrinkles disappear as she watches the film, shot on her birthday, the ninetieth, spent among friends who persevered in being alive was her childhood really so happy, was it like the brilliance of stars, “look”, she says, “everything falls, exactly like then, we…all…falling” Am I good enough Read more

Girls on the balcony It was perhaps the passing time that elevated it to idyll, that little girl’s standing on one small balcony, her fear of being discovered, the joy of being alive from the fifth floor, looking onto the trees in the courtyard, surrounded by curious eyes of windows, Read more

August On the last Sunday in August, when cold winds press against their measured pace, the survivors still come to name the dead.   A hall, spare and simple, is cavernous without you, an empty chair beside me— in case I need to whisper in your ear. Memory is never Read more

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My mother tells her friends My mother is telling the story Around the dining table a glass of sherry in her hand. The guests are fascinated that she is able To speak so coolly. They don’t understand. Katalin listens time and time again never really hearing what is being said. Read more

Completion A life time ago On Klatovy station Sitting on a swing Hearing the old joke “Your Aunty Rudolph and Uncle Else are coming” Small uncle and tall aunt arriving Bringing amazing gifts from distant Berlin A round doll’s house with street lights at its centre, A huge rocking horse Read more

Off Haverstock Hill Short, plump, elderly German Jewish woman Wandering into the shared kitchen, Sniffing at my cooking Saying “how can you eat such food Herr Schaufeld? Come, have some of my good chicken.” Mrs Brietman, marching into our small rented room Changing the light bulb to a lower wattage Read more

My Father’s Long Crawl to Freedom My Father’s Long Crawl to Freedom The plate hit the floor. The shit hit the fan. The blood hit the brain. The mind hit the wall. My father hit his end. My mother hit the phone. The doctors hit the meds. Dad hit the Read more