Mother. Weimer-style hat, face veil.  
Grandfather, moustache, cigarette, papillon tie.  
 
They pose like silent movie stars, 
radiant in noir, golden-age lighting, 
sepia portraits on large cotton rag sheets, 
frosted silk flaps on top. 
Life will never end, right?  
 
Mother derides nostalgia: Want the photos? 
Cousin David, the cardiologist, took them. 
 
She digs out a snapshot on smaller, matte paper:  
Mother, laughing, in a Tel Aviv café,  
white shirt, khakis, sunglasses.  
David. On a visit, 1936. 
 
Flat, he complained, no contrast, no chiaroscuro.
Middle Eastern sun. Unforgiving blaze. 
 
She puts them back in the worn leather folder: Here, take them.
 
Cousin David is gone, she says: Gone back home, to Berlin.  
 
Gone back home, to Berlin, he couldn’t find himself here. 
Gone back home, to Berlin, he loved so much. 
Gone back home to Berlin and hanged himself.

It’s a wrap.  
The actors peel off their dead-face make-up,  
a silly zombie monster movie I’m filming. 
My day-off, Sunday in Berlin. 
 
Salt covers the snowy roads to Weissensee, 
a district in the East, a name fitting for the cemetery 
near the Weisser See, White Lake.  
Weissensee. I’m off to Weissensee. 
 
Great-Grandparents, their sepia wedding photo,  
dazzling, in Victorian thread, their eyes, their love, 
they know, don’t they, they can see, don’t they,  
the bright future that lies ahead. 
 
Zionist cause, no thanks, land in the desert, 
no, not for us, Germans, our parents,  
grandparents, great-grandparents, German, 
our children, grandchildren, German. German. 
 
A loaf of bread, a can of tallow, two apples, 
she brought home in a large carpet bag.  
Their savings, pension, all, hyperinflation,  
Reichsmarks, thousands, bills that fill a carpet bag, 
same carpet bag she carried back home,   
with a loaf of bread, can of tallow, two apples. 
 
Mother said that loaf of bread alone  
could be a Tel Aviv hospital instead. 
She remembered them, sweet old couple,  
penniless, arriving by train from Königsberg. 
 
Weissensee. I rhythm-stomp, grave after grave,  
after grave, chanting And who shall I say is calling? 
 
It’s dark in Weissensee, I’m lost in Weissensee,   
one-hundred-fifteen-thousand graves in Weissensee, 
the snow isn’t snow in Weissensee, it’s dirty, stinging ice.  
I tried my best in Weissensee; my good intentions will suffice. 
 
Damn, this cemetery, it’s night, how do I get out,  
back to the chic lobby, the Adlon hotel,  
where Nazi higher echelon loved to stay.  
Early morning they’ll await me, my monsters, 
grinning through their silicon masks. 
 
I swerve around, 
slip and fall. I raise my head.  
See before me:  
tandem graves, 
headstones toppled,  
overgrown with moss and vine.  
1932,  
two weeks apart. 
 
Lights glare, black Mercedes pickup beams, 
hop in, the smiling attendant calls,  
I’m locking the gates  
and you don’t want to spend the night. 
 
I place a rock by each name,  
Rebecca, Isaac, auf wiedersehen.