19332

Judaism, Summer, 1995 by Marc J. Straus

First it was breakfast in Barbados, now

next to me on the beach in Mayereau.

Maybe if I concentrate on the emerald water;

nineteen sailboats in the bay, thirty three

wind surfers. I stop, realizing the symmetry.

The numbers: a blue black tattoo, so clear

over fifty years later. And, when I talk

to her, she swings the left suntanned forearm

around -- numbers in full view. She asks me

what I do, where I live -- about my

children. I say: doctor New York -- two.

There's the symmetry again. Such a low

number, meaning she was taken early.

She tells me her age; captured at age nineteen,

I calculate. The forearm flashes again. Nineteen

sailboats. She sees me staring. The world

comes full circle, she says, pointing. Everything

has meaning. This number was meant to survive.

Two men behind me playing steel drums ...