MY FATHER, WHO IS STILL AMONG THE LIVING

My father, who is still among the living
I never see him, but I know that he's less than he was
his brothers unseen,
incinerated in Poland
and he learned of his mother's death by telegram
his father left him nothing, not a button
and who knows if he inherited his character.
My father, who had been a tailor and a communist
who never talked who sat on the terrace
who didn't believe in God
and had no use for mankind either
despising Hitler, despising Stalin
my father who once a year tossed back a shot of whiskey
my father gorging on apples in a neighbor's
tree
when the reds came into town
and forced my grandfather to dance like a bear on the sabbath
and forced him to smoke a cigarette on the sabbath
and my father fled the village forever
ever after hissed his contempt for the October Revolution
forever repeating that Trotsky was a dreamer and Beria a thug
his tiny figure seated on the terrace hating books also,
because,
he told me, the dreams of men are merest fiction
the histories are lies, and paper will put up with anything.
My father who had been a tailor and a communist.