Prayer 11

A network of branches crazes the sky like cracks in the glaze of a Chinese cup. Dawn, a poised dropper. History poised also. A man on the steet corner waves his sign: Germany 1934. So cold, elbows of trees creak when something flaps by— the craw craw craw— Would I be able to recognize places in Latvia by my father's absence— farmyard littered with dented milk cans, mattresses leaking straw, table set for a meal that never happened? Every morning I look out a window at a scene he wouldn't recognize, blue tide of sunrise spreading west obliterating tracks of satellites, gray tide of inlet shoring up the wrack-line. My father steps through his window. He's put on his SS uniform. He stands on a dirt road, staring toward the vanishing point where the past is rectified. The first thing I heard this morning—three harsh cries—was the black crow veering past his head.History, welcome back, it said. I watch to see what he does next. —12.8.2012