where I am not banished from the city
for being a Jew
where ideas
words
are free
to anyone who wants them.
ideas
Socialism
(the man on the soapbox explains)
means no one is better than anyone else
everyone shares
the same rights
the same protection
the same opportunity
no matter their station
no matter their religion
no matter their gender.
At last!
I have a name for the ideas in my head.
He gives me pamphlets
invites me to lectures
asks questions
I do not yet
have answers for.
At last!
There is work for my mind in England.
December 3, 1904
After months of waiting,
finally
our boat comes.
Three stout masts
and two funnels
thrust up from a deck
skirted by rooms
for those who can pay
for a glimpse
of the sky.
We watch
as fine ladies follow a trail of porters
carrying trunks to their cabins,
our breath forming frosty clouds
of impatience
in the air.
Then the second class
boards, all order
and dignity
without so much as a glance
for us
who wait on the docks
perched on the bulging sacks
that hold everything we own,
the drear
that never lifts from the air
wetting our hair
seeping through our skin
into our bones.
When steerage is called
a flurry of movement
spins around us:
families call to each other
link arms,
the little ones cry
hold tight against the push
and pull
that could pry
them apart
as the great horde
of people
are herded
toward the cargo hold.
It does not seem like we will all fit into that
hole
in the ship’s deck
but the line keeps moving;
the ship swallows
us all.
There is no adventure
in steerage
in the misery
that waits for us
beneath.
I know why I
will send myself
into that filthy darkness
but I wonder
as I watch
the travel-weary faces
march past
what private horrors
improbable hopes
spur them on.
We shuffle forward
until Mama and Papa, my brothers and I
step onto the gangplank
over the gray, foaming water,
onto the sea-washed decks.
The crewmen,
cheeks chapped by rough winds,
their eyes fixed
in a squint,
point us down the steep ladder.
In the hold below
lit only by greasy portholes
there is nothing to break
the press of unwashed bodies, to move
the tepid,
stale
air.
I find myself
wishing for the fog
longing for the chill.
We claim our bunks:
metal slabs
two high
two wide
each covered with a burlap mattress
a life preserver for a pillow
a small pail—for eating?—
not unlike
the one Miriam used to scatter
the chicken feed.
Papa and Mama and little Benjamin
take one bunk
Marcus and Nathan
settle into another.
I sling my sack onto a top bunk
crawl up after it
turn my face to the tarred planks
that separate us
from the ice-cold water.
The mattress crinkles beneath me
filling the air with a pungent,
briny scent.
What kind of hay
smells like the sea?
I pick at a loose seam
pull out a strand of the brittle stuffing.
Seaweed.
The heat at the back of my eyes
disperses
the ball in my throat
dissolves
I pull my book of poems
from the bottom of my sack
hide it in the crook
between my knees and shoulders
whisper each line
in time
to the gently rocking boat.
Nicco
A young woman and her tiny baby boy
share the mattress next to mine.
She holds a hand to her chest
and says,
Isabella.
She touches
a single finger
to the boy’s downy cheek.
A smile warms her voice:
Nicco.
She sings to him
in a language
that sounds
like a songbird.
I wonder why she is here
in the belly of this boat
all alone.
The engines roar
the ship blasts its great horn
groans away
from the docks.
I stay below.
I have no desire to watch
the old world
fading
as we pull away from its shores.
It is only when we are far
from the docks
and the supper line
has begun to form in front of giant
simmering vats
full of grisly stew
that Mama’s search
through our bundles
becomes frantic.
Where is the tinned fish
and the matzo?
Where is all the food
we brought from home?
We scramble to help
counting bundles
upending piles of travel-worn clothing
but it is no use
we must have left it behind
at the poorhouse
or in the confusion
at the docks.
Without the food from Mama’s store
keeping kosher on this ship
is impossible.
Before Papa has the chance
to utter an edict
I will not follow
I grab my pail
and say,
We all know
America does not take in
the sick.
A ten-day fast
would make us all seem weak
and sickly.
Mama’s arm lifts to cover
Nathan’s shoulders.
I say,
If we do not eat
we will be sent back.
I reach a hand to Benjamin
he looks between Mama
and Papa
and back at my outstretched hand
his stomach grumbles
as it is always doing.
Papa sighs
Mama passes a pail
to each of us.
Benjamin places his small hand
in mine,
together
as a family
we walk to the end of the line.
at sea
It is the strangest thing—
belowdecks
I know it is the sea
tossing us
side to side
sometimes rocking
sometimes pitching
but to climb into the open air
and see nothing
for miles
but rolling gray waves
as if a legion of beasts
skimmed the water in perfect formation
just below the surface
—to see the force
that holds us
at its mercy
is a thing
I cannot find words to express.
Though the wind
lashes my skin
like shattered icicles,
as often as I can
I walk the section of the upper deck
permitted to us in steerage,
stumbling in the open air
like a newborn goat
on spindly legs
not to be trusted,
giggling
at my own clumsiness.
If Hanna and Miriam were with me
we would dance
on the pitching deck
holding hands
and singing.
I dance anyway
all by myself
and send my song
into the wind.
sons
Mama cannot resist
the cooing baby
(even if he is
Italian)
she clucks over little Nicco
while I duck behind her shoulder
then pop out again
to see his eyes flash wide
to hear his laughter
bubble to the surface
again and again and again.
In such close quarters
everyone pretends
not to see
hear
smell
everyone else.
But Nicco
has our neighbors
in the bunks around us
leaning in
smiling, even.
Papa turns his back
gathers his boys
around him
opens the Book of Job for study.
He does not have to say a word
for his opinion
to be heard.
I wonder if Papa ever looked at me
the way Isabella
with her musical words
and small, happy smile
looks at Nicco.
Or is that kind of feeling
reserved
only for sons?
breathe
The weather has turned.
Storms lash the waves
and us in them
across the roiling face of the water.
I thought there could not be a smell worse
than fish and brine,
unbathed skin and rotting seaweed.
But the storm has chased those
made sick by the sea
belowdecks.
One thousand souls
share the same foul space.
The air burns with the reek of vomit;
the floors
are slick with filth.
I have to use the toilet
but I make myself wait
out the storm.
I cannot risk a trip
to the toilets
where the sickest among us
swarm in their misery.
We all know
about the island of tears
that waits for us
at the end
of this endless ocean
the place where the sick are culled
turned back
turned away.
I will not go back
—not after the possibility of a life
filled with meaning
has been dangled before me.
I will not allow anyone
to send me back.
I tuck my face into the crook of my arm
breathe the smell
of my own skin,
try to think of something
—anything
else.
morning
Our fifth day at sea
dawns clear
and terribly cold.
The ocean is calm as bathwater
lapping at the edges of the sky.
Out here
in the middle
of the sea
the sun does not even look
like the sun.
With nothing to frame it
tree branches
thatched roofs
church towers
it is just a waxy brightness
sliding oh so slowly
across the sky
as if there were no need
to mark the time passing
at all.
fighting
Little Nicco is sick.
His face is red with fever, his fists balled,
fighting.
The ship’s surgeon visited,
only his eyes visible
above the cloth
pressed to his nose and mouth.
(whether to keep infection
at bay
or just the stench
of this place
I cannot say)
He listened to the boy’s heart
and lungs
felt for the faint pulse
inspected mouth and eyes.
I have no herbs here;
all my grand ideas
my secret studies
could not save anyone
in Kishinev
cannot help Nicco
now.
I pick up Isabella’s pail
and wait
for over an hour in line.
The cook sloshes a ladleful
of gray gruel inside
without meeting my eyes.
I lift the pail onto our bunk,
set it beside Isabella.
Mama pulls Nathan
away from the sick boy
lifts her hand
to check his brow
settles the round bulk of her body
between her son
and the sickness.
She has no more room
in her bruised heart
for sorrow.
I wrap my shawl around my shoulders,
climb up the ladder
onto the deck.
Are our prayers
even heard out here
in the middle of the fickle sea?
I turn my face into the wind
until I cannot hear
Nicco’s weakening cries
until I cannot see
Isabella’s panicked eyes
anymore.
sinking
He died in the mid
dle of the night.
No one slept
through the sound
of Isabella’s grief.
I climbed out of my bunk
squeezed next to
Benjamin.
In the morning
the ship’s carpenter rips apart
an apple crate
nails a few of the planks
back together.
Isabella lays her baby inside
the tiny coffin,
turns away
while they hammer the lid
shut.
The captain says a prayer
lowers the narrow pine box
onto the waves.
The box was lined with sand,
holes bored in the sides
so it would sink
swiftly,
but even so, the pale glimmer
of the little coffin in the water
seems to follow us as far as it can
before sinking
into the deep.
shiva
I do not know how Isabella’s people
honor the dead.
Our rules can bend
and flex
when our family is at risk
but Papa would not approve
of me altering the old ways
for this.
Still,
in the time we have left
I will bring Isabella water for washing
and food,
set a bowl of water
at the end of our bunk
as if she were one of us,
sitting shiva
for the only family
she had left.
The captain says
we will arrive in America in a few days.
I wonder
if the old ways
will have any place
in this new world.
close enough
I spotted a tern
flying over the ship today,
a chevron of white
against a perfectly
blue sky.
The arctic air gusting off the sea
tossed it about;
it flapped
haphazard,
wayward,
fighting against the wind.
Until that moment,
I never wondered
where all the birds had gone.
They flew beside
and above us
for a few miles
off the English shoreline:
skuas,
cormorants,
and ungainly big-mouthed pelicans.
But in the middle of the Atlantic
with no coast to break the endless water
the sky was empty.
To see one now
means we are close to shore.
One day,
maybe two,
and we are there.
So close
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