Janice Bishop
Memory Prism
There will always be Chopin
amid a flurry of snowflakes
as on that singular afternoon
when Ulrich's mother
in a swirl of cognac nostalgia
opens her trunk to fondle
hidden coins of Hitler
Mein Kampf protected in flight
from the Russian advance
photos of herself
in new dresses
a new school
her new brown uniform
tokens of her horizon
in the Third Reich
splayed across pictures of LIFE
"The death camps
that never happened
that Jewish press," she slurs
the cognac crashing to the floor
Her throat thick
as the throttled cry of my father
dumb to explain
the six million murdered
wrapped in a maelstrom of snow
and splintered glass
amid a flurry of lies
my horizon at age ten
is obscured
amid a flurry of snowflakes
as on that singular afternoon
when Ulrich's mother
in a swirl of cognac nostalgia
opens her trunk to fondle
hidden coins of Hitler
Mein Kampf protected in flight
from the Russian advance
photos of herself
in new dresses
a new school
her new brown uniform
tokens of her horizon
in the Third Reich
splayed across pictures of LIFE
"The death camps
that never happened
that Jewish press," she slurs
the cognac crashing to the floor
Her throat thick
as the throttled cry of my father
dumb to explain
the six million murdered
wrapped in a maelstrom of snow
and splintered glass
amid a flurry of lies
my horizon at age ten
is obscured
Page(s) 3
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