my Slovak grandpa’s back
heading down the street in black:
jacket, pants, fedora lid
his lunch box, arched-top, also black
swung the rhythm of his pace
he walked to work solid as a Clydesdale
regular as tock and tick
determined as time, rough edged
but eased by love, came at 16 by ship,
left Carpathian white-caps and shadows,
leaving mother, sisters, their Slavic earth
in the dust of morning mist
no look-back other than to insist—
to remind me that despite the callused hands on war’s ax,
the way it hacks us indiscriminately into nations—
that I was Slovak, not Czech, as if such distinctions
had meaning other than in the
…. word-making
…. myth-spinning
…. me-making
…. minds of men
.
Jim Culleny
3/2/17
Blink 