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THE GHETTO
III
The sturdy Ghetto children
March by the parade,
Waving their toy flags,
Prancing to the bugles--
Lusty, unafraid...
Shaking little fire sticks
At the night--
The old blinking night--
Swerving out of the way,
Wrapped in her darkness like a shawl.
But a small girl
Cowers apart.
Her braided head,
Shiny as a black-bird's
In the gleam of the torch-light,
Is poised as for flight.
Her eyes have the glow
Of darkened lights.
She stammers in Yiddish,
But I do not understand,
And there flits across her face
A shadow
As of a drawn blind.
I give her an orange,
Large and golden,
And she looks at it blankly.
I take her little cold hand and try to draw her to me,
But she is stiff...
Like a doll...
Suddenly she darts through the crowd
Like a little white panic
Blown along the night--
Away from the terror of oncoming feet...
And drums rattling like curses in red roaring mouths...
And torches spluttering silver fire
And lights that nose out hiding-places...
To the night--
Squatting like a hunchback
Under the curved stoop--
The old mammy-night
That has outlived beauty and knows the ways of fear--
The night--wide-opening crooked and comforting arms,
Hiding her as in a voluminous skirt.
The sturdy Ghetto children
March by the parade,
Waving their toy flags,
Prancing to the bugles,
Lusty, unafraid.
But I see a white frock
And eyes like hooded lights
Out of the shadow of pogroms
Watching... watching...
(next)
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