by Judith Sanders (Pittsburgh, PA)
On their Bronx subway platform,
they hold my hands.
She with her hatpin and cloth coat.
He in a button-down and tie clip,
worn for this holiday
from cashiering at a newsstand.
We wait for the train to Manhattan,
where they never go, except today,
for me, their scrubbed, chubby grandchild,
who can’t speak their language
and has her own room.
She was never yanked from school.
Would never know, God willing,
the soldiers, the nightmare of ripping
and smashing, the mother’s screams.
My parents don’t care about the Ice Capades,
the ladies in sequins, twirled by men in tights.
They are going to the symphony.
Bubbe and Zayde guard me, one on each side,
from the clatter of the oncoming train.
They do not ask why I want to go
to the Ice Capades, when my whole life
is one glide down smooth ice, an escapade,
a frolic.
Judith Sanders’ poetry collection In Deep was recently published by Kelsay Books. Her work appears in numerous journals, including Pleiades, The American Scholar, Modern Language Studies, Der Pakn Treger, and Poetica, and on the websites Vox Populi and Full Grown People. She lives with her family in Pittsburgh.
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