July 2022
Roseanne Freed
roseanne.freed@gmail.com
roseanne.freed@gmail.com
Bio Note: I was born in Johannesburg, South Africa and now live in Los Angeles. I worked at the Getty Museum Gift Store for over a decade and now I share my fascination for the natural world by leading school children on hikes in the Santa Monica Mountains. My poetry has been published in Verse-Virtual, Blue Heron Review and ONE ART among others.
Where are you from?
One busy summer Sunday at the Getty Museum gift store, I gave a middle-aged woman her change, but instead of moving away from my register she just stared at the coins in her hand. She must’ve seen my irritation because she said, No worries, I’m just looking at your money. I’ve never seen it before. She was Australian. L.A is a busy hub between our two countries— and a lot of Ozzies visit the museum. Where are you from? she asked me. The name of my birth country is always followed by too many questions, so I often say England, and I still don’t know why, with all those people in the line behind her, I told her the truth. What a coincidence, she said, I’m also South African. To meet someone from back home is a happy occasion. I was doubly delighted to discover we came from the same city. Her name was Carmella. I didn’t catch her surname— it began with a Z. I told her I’ve only known one Carmella—my sister’s childhood friend. Who is your sister? she asked. This woman, a stranger from Australia was my sister’s best friend. I remembered her as a short chubby girl who peered through thick lenses of her spectacles. I didn’t recognize you without glasses, I said. We laughed. And then we cried.
Signs
Your daughter is going to send you butterflies, or little white moths, a psychic told me, a month after Mahalia died. I see them. You can’t ignore a butterfly if it flies around you while you hike on an otherwise empty trail. Hello, I say, Thank you for coming, and blow kisses. The pandemic forces us to honor her memory remotely. Using our computers, we’re able to join Shabbat services from her synagogue in Vancouver. Today’s service opens with three women singing a cappella in the shul garden, and when it continues with the mourner’s kaddish, the two-thousand-year-old prayer for the souls of our departed loved ones that begins, Yitgadal v’yitkadash sh’mei raba, a white moth flies in circles above their heads. Shabbat Shalom Mahalia. YouTube video of Roseanne reading "Signs."
©2022 Roseanne Freed
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