by Barbara Krasner (Somerset, NJ)
On the marble and wood credenza I inherited
from my mother and Melray’s mid-century
modern furniture I’ve arranged an altar
of the wedding portraits of my ancestors:
two sets of grandparents, one set
of paternal grandparents. There are
no existing photographs of the other grandparents—
either because they believed photography
would steal their souls or their images
drowned in vulnerable cardboard boxes
placed too close to the basement boiler.
One framed photo is of me, walking down
the aisle with my son at his wedding.
There is no wedding portrait of me.
Even in my mother’s dining room,
a gallery of wedding portraits
of my sisters and their grooms,
mine was removed after the divorce,
subject to basement floods thereafter.
This curation at the altar reminds me
of where I came from, a reminder
of Yahrzeit candles to light
according to the dates I’ve registered
with HebCal, a reminder I’m alone
and yet not alone.
Barbara Krasner holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts and a PhD in Holocaust & Genocide Studies (HGS) from Gratz College, where she teaches in the HGS graduate programs. The author of two poetry chapbooks and three novels in verse, her work has appeared in Jewish Literary Journal, Tiferet, Minyan, Jewishfiction.net, Michigan Quarterly Review, and elsewhere. She serves as Director, Mercer County (NJ) Holocaust, Genocide & Human Rights Education Center.
The Jewish Writing Project 