Visiting My Grandmother in Birkenau

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Some say humans

are hardwired for it. I don’t

know. Streaks

of color, skin burning

vermillion. Would you believe

my grandmother had a million

different voices? Big toes black

 

from the frostbite?

Me either. Is that too cynical

of me? Sometimes

I think I hear her, Vicki?

She calls me Vicki?

It sounds like this:

fib fib fib fib fib. What’s

the use of this?

What’s the use of air

 

tasting of tin or how the woods

smelled like a damp heavy quilt?

Just get over it. O steel guardian.

O flying statue. O you in the pit

of liquefied ashes. I placed

a small chalky stone

on a plaque near where your foot

might have fallen. Just to hold you

down a while. Just to keep you

still.