Kholmech

Kholmech Sign and Book of Letters

A Poem of Reunion

When we first sat down together in an apartment in Germany, I read the following poem to my cousins in a very halting Russian:

 

TOGETHER
AGAIN

On a perfect

day, in a strange

land, in this

improbable

place, far from

our homes,

divided by a

great ocean,

and by the

vast ocean

of history,

separated by

emigration,

by starvation,

repression,

expropriation,

extermination,

by every horror

known and

visited by

man upon man,

a family reunites,

this family

of survivors,

that through

fate or good

fortune made

its way down

perilous roads,

across great

distances,

from a shtetl

called Kholmech

to this exact spot,

to Nuremburg,

on this most

perfect day.

November 4, 2004