Uncle
Your paintings hang
in slick black metal frames
on my dining room wall --
their shining splashes of feathers
and sunset tribal dances clashing
with your father’s watercolored
synagogues and a glass closet
full of wine cups
and star-shaped candlesticks.
Those paintings arrived
in a brownish-gray envelope
when I turned twelve and became
a Jewish adult, with a letter
justifying your absence,
the looping handwriting too
elegant for the crumpled
looseleaf paper
that still lives crammed
in my top dresser drawer
with fading journals
and scratched-out stories.
When I still lived in that
yellow house of childhood,
you visited -- Dad’s disappearing
brother who has brown
skin and smooth hands.
We inflated trash bags
with helium, giggling
as the black masses lifted
past our heads.
I only saw you two other times,
but silence separated us--
my shyness and your mystery--
black eyes hiding
behind overgrown bangs.
I never understood your
temporary addresses
(Kansas City, now Sioux Falls,
Springfield, now Independence),
the shadows in your eyes
with burned images of the reservation
(how it itches your hands to reach
for those brown bottles),
how you lived --
Jewish and Sioux--
your detachment --
as I’m left
with the swirling
purples and blues
of your acrylic sunsets.
(c) 2000 Ann Lesley Hamvas
(since 15 May 2001)
