Here, O Israel? and other poems by Leah Shelleda

The Jews of Vienna

Perhaps they thought that Moses brought them there.

The milk

whipped into domes

floating on chocolate,

the honey

liquified consonants,

ambered vowels.

.

Think of their life as a pastry:

Layers of insulating crust,

fillings more fulfilling

than prophecy

in this marbled bestiary of a city.

Gargoyles, griffins, fishtail and fire-breath.

.

“You shall make no graven images” He said

but where is it written

that you cannot settle into

someone else’s gilt?

.

A music box of a city.

Box seats, of course,

Mother-of-pearl eyes

and jeweled heads nodding  Yes and Yes.

.

In the cafes,

Freud, Kokoschka

and the followers of Marx

divided the coming century

among themselves,

as though it was a torte

and they were silver knives.

.

Wittgenstein’s sister danced at the balls.

Philosophy, as they knew it,

rehearsed it’s final acts

behind muffled velvet.

.

But the poor Jews, the ostjuden, fleeing Galicia,

had barely arrived

when the milk soured.

Their blistered feet stick

in the honey

as it hardened.

.

When the Jews lose the concoction of Vienna,

When they  move to the back lots of America,

They will have to invent

the movies.

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