John GuzlowskiWe came with heavy suitcases
made from wooden boards by brothers we left behind, came from Buchenwald and Katowice and before that Lwow, our mother’s true home, came with our tongues in tatters, our teeth in our pockets, hugging only ourselves, our bodies stiff like frightened ostriches. We were the children in ragged wool who shuffled in line to eat or pray or beg anyone for charity. Remembering the air and the trees, the sky above the Polish fields, we dreamt only of the lives waiting for us in Chicago and St. Louis and Superior, Wisconsin like pennies in our mouths. |
