LOST
(For Max Katz, d. 1998)
Doofus.
Self-seeker.
Absentee brain.
His mind went on vacation long ago.
Neurons and synapses miss each other
two drunken lovers trying to copulate
but not remembering how or why.
Left his brother out to dry
fall through the floor in bankruptcy. Yet
he is the only person my ex-wife
can ever forgive.
Consider.
He was among the first
("Who volunteers? you, you, and you"),
pulled from the ranks of enlisted men
during the 1945 rush through Germany
the need put out for otherwise despised Jews
the call for Yiddish speakers
You men have to talk to these people
find out...my God...what happened here!
These people
What people
Taste and see:
it is Bergen-Belsen
and it smells and
it screams and
even the air has a taste
and Max has to smell
and he has to listen
and he has to talk
and by the third day
something has broken
wires ripped out of a lamp
wires crackle and dance up and down
never reconnected.
--
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Ken Wolman rainermaria.typepad.com
We're neither pure, nor wise, nor good
We'll do the best we know.
We'll build our house and chop our wood
And make our garden grow...
Bernstein/Wilbur, "Candide"
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