a seabird could fly out and back
in a day.
But not close enough
for Nicco.
land
We are belowdecks
when shouts and cheers
erupt above.
We scramble for the stairs
like a crowd fleeing
a burning building
everyone rushing
to the front of the boat
for a glimpse of the thin gray line
on the horizon.
My brothers hoot and dance
Papa prays
Mama’s eyes are bright
her fingers lift to cover trembling lips.
As the ship pulls into the harbor
the spires of giant buildings
thrust into the clouds.
Everyone is pointing
gasping
marveling
at the wonder
of a city built toward the sky.
The port teems with traffic:
tugboats, ferries
and small fishing craft
rock in the waves we send in all directions.
The mother of the exiles
holds her torch aloft
greeting us in the water.
The clouds break apart
and for a moment
pure
clean
rays of sunshine
reach through the heavens
to dance across my cheeks.
Here,
at last,
a welcome.
Even for us.
lines
We hurry to gather our things,
impatient
to feel the earth
beneath us again.
A quarantine doctor
nods in approval
as the first-class passengers disembark
(he barely looks them over)
and then the second class, too.
For us?
More lines.
One to get on the ferry
one to get off the ferry.
A line
snaking through
the warehouse
s o l o n g
it wraps like a curving tail
around the back.
A line
that ends
in a verdict:
stay
or go?
I turn
to where Isabella waits,
slumped
defeated.
Inconsolable
and insane
are easily mistaken
one for the other.
The thought of her
being turned around,
sent back over that fitful ocean
again
is unbearable.
I rush back to where she stands,
ignoring Mama’s cries,
I wipe her face
prop her up
pinch some life
into her cheeks
so after everything
at the very least
she has a chance to begin again
in this new place.
medical inspection
White veined walls
naked lightbulbs
humming
cold metal
instruments
pinching
eyes staring
squinting
roving
up and down
fingers poking
prodding
goose bumps ripple along my bare skin
shame blooms
scarlet
on my cheeks.
powerless
Always more lines.
Waiting for this inspection
that interview
a stamp on those papers.
Mama and I pass through the inspection
and soon Papa, Marcus and Benjamin join us.
But where is Nathan?
I have never seen Papa
so powerless
as when Mama began to question
then wail
then beat her fists against
his chest.
Where is my son?
There is nothing wrong
with his lungs,
Mama insists.
He is perfectly healthy.
Papa speaks
in a tender voice
I have never heard
him use.
The doctor said
they will keep him here
for a few weeks
and return him to us
when the infection clears.
And if it does not?
Mama asks
but Papa only shakes his head
closes his hands over her fists.
The high ceilings echo
with cries.
We are not the only family
culled
the strong from the weak.
A moment ago
relief pulsed through my body
now it has turned
into icy trails of guilt.
blind
We wait
on the whims
of officials
who have forgotten
how to smile.
Papa swears
to be faithful to this new country
to forsake the land we left behind.
He whispers a promise of his own,
an echo of King David’s words:
If I turn traitor
to this, our new home
may my right hand wither
from the arm I now raise.
This moment
that should have felt
like coming home
has left us stumbling
and starting at any noise,
casting around
as if we have lost
our sight
unsure how to move forward
while leaving one of our own
behind.
aliens
I do not know what I expected
when we finally stepped off the ferry
onto American soil
as landed immigrants
legal aliens.
Maybe that the sun would shine
a little brighter
that someone
would share in our sigh
of relief.
We heft our sacks
over our shoulders.
It is just as Mama always says:
When the Messiah comes,
keep working.
New York City
We step away from the pier
a cheerless
muddled bunch.
We follow the line of immigrants
into a bank of dark buildings
that rise like cliffs
all around us.
I have never seen
a city so frantic
so full.
The squawk of gulls
the clang of buoys fade
before the rumble
of pushcarts on cobbled streets,
footsteps like droning
drumbeats.
The briny sea gives way
to the smell
of wet newsprint
roasted peanuts
coffee brewing
in a street-side café
piles of garbage spoiling
in the alleys.
The streets are a tangle of trolleys,
<
br /> motorcars, horse-drawn carriages
and an unending spool
of people going briskly
about their business.
After the third or fourth turn
I cannot see where we left
the ocean behind.
How can you tell north from south
east from west
in a place
with no horizon?
Benjamin,
I say,
trying to coax a smile
onto his mournful face,
can you count the windows
going up?
How can a tower
of steel and glass
fly so high?
Before long,
he is a hummingbird
impossibly small
unable to stop
zooming
this way
and that
gawking
puzzling
marveling.
Before long,
our footsteps drag
and stumble,
I lose count
of the city blocks
we have walked.
I switch my sack from my left arm
to my right
and then,
after another dozen blocks,
onto my head,
steady it with both hands
to keep it safe
from the crowd of people
pushing past.
My skirt is impossibly grimy
from months of travel
I do not bother to lift it away
from the sloshing,
spitting puddles.
To our right
arched pillars rise out of the East River
stout cables lash the Brooklyn Bridge
to the earth.
Men in fine suits
children
workers
saunter across
as if such majesty
were their birthright.
something we understand
We step a little quicker
when the babble around us
becomes a clamor
we understand.
The third person Papa asks
points us to a building
with a vacant sign in the window.
The landlord leads us
up gaslit stairways
flanked by walls
covered in peeling paper
and cracked molding.
He unlocks the door
to a dim apartment
we can rent for ten dollars a month,
three tiny rooms
for all six of us.
(when Nathan
joins us, that is)
But we have sturdy wood planks
beneath our feet
two windows to the street
where you can see
a scrap of blue
if you press your cheek
against the glass,
tilt your head skyward.
The toilet is indoors!
(though we have to share it
with the three other families
on our floor)
But the smell—
it almost makes me wish
the thing was outside after all.
The first thing Mama does
in our new
(if well-worn) apartment
is unwrap the Shabbos candlesticks
place them in the center
of the table.
The first thing Papa does
is unwrap the mezuzahs
that traveled all those months,
safe in his breast pocket,
and nail them to the doorposts.
I hang a blanket over the
air shaft window
to keep the Polish woman next door
from watching everything we do.
Marcus unpacks his books
recites Torah
as if nothing
has changed.
night
In the shtetl
I could escape to the woods
when I needed a moment
for myself.
In this city
in this tenement
in this apartment,
private moments
are hard to come by.
Mama draws the curtains
over the windows to the street
Papa follows her into their room
and closes the door.
In the parlor
Marcus arranges pillows
Benjamin stretches out
head on the sofa
hips and feet propped up
on a row of crates
a broad smile on his face
as if this were all
a grand adventure.
I have a bed to myself
little bigger than a crib
tucked beside the kitchen stove.
It is lucky I am so short!
And lucky, too,
this luxury of sleeping alone.
For once I am grateful
to be a girl
in this family.
When all is dark
and the noise of the city
has dimmed,
my mind opens
like a nighthawk’s wings
gliding beneath the stars.
In the shtetl,
to speak the secret wishes
of my heart
would have been foolish.
Impossible, even.
But here
I think
(I hope)
it is not so.
I test the air
with my softest whispers
to see if it can bear
the weight of my dreams:
I will go to school to study.
I will become a doctor.
stitches
In the sliver of daylight
beside the parlor window
Mama picks out my stitches
one at a time.
Every woman in our building
takes in piecework
to help pay the rent.
We borrow a pair of needles
a wooden spool of thread
to practice.
Again,
Mama says.
Smaller. Neater
this time.
I grit my teeth.
Surgeons need still hands
for all those
small,
neat stitches.
If the way to my dreams must be laid
on a trail of tiny stitches
at least they leave a path
for me to follow.
I bend
over the scrap of linen
stretched taut
like a gypsy’s tent between my fingers
and stitch,
stitch,
stitch.
gloom
Our first week in the city,
Mama goes out every day
asking for a job.
Papa and my brothers
go to shul
to pray
for Nathan.
I stay
in the apartment
in the tenement
jammed against the ones beside it
leaning toward the one behind it,
the one before it blocking all the light.
Until we have an income
we cannot a
fford luxuries
like oil for the lamps
so I take down the blanket
over the air shaft window
prop the door to the hallway open
so a little light
can find its way in
to the kitchen
while I wipe the coal stains
from the walls
scrub away the grime
the last tenants left behind.
I set the dishes for meat,
the spoon
the ladle
the knife
in the cupboard
across from the stove.
I arrange the dishes for milk,
the spoon
the whisk
the glasses
on the shelf above my bed.
In any extra hour
I can steal
for myself
I walk outside
under the pale winter sky.
Water towers perch like buzzards
on top of the buildings,
elevated trains
scatter dust and grime
block the sunlight
as they rumble past
casting blinking shadows—
an arpeggio of piano keys
playing on the streets below.
Children sell pretzels
and papers
men fill the cafés
and synagogues,
the noise of their debate
their study
their davening
spilling out onto the streets.
I wonder,
where are all the girls my age?
possibility
A woman with a baby on her hip
scoops coal into a dented pail
as I descend into the cellar.
We talk
as she scoops;
she waits,
talks some more
as I fill my pail, too.
She has the best news—
there is a school on Madison Street!
The moment my chores are finished
I walk across half of the East Side
to get there,
to the Jacob Gordon Free School.
[free]
I would happily
walk all day
for such
possibility.
I ask inside
just to be sure,
though I do not see any girls
in the classroom.
The director behind her desk
answers,
Yes, of course
all are welcome
free of charge
though there is something
she does not say
some pitying thing
in her eyes.
I memorize
the cross streets
sketch a picture
in my mind
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