Roots in the Air by MILAN RICHTER

In the air, that’s where your roots are, over there, in the air.

--Paul Celan

Where to, doctor? Cemetery?

Yes, my friend, making my grave rounds. Our

mother’s there

my brother too, and the wife’s niece, buried last

year,

only seventeen, leukemia, it seems. And you sir?

Home. The days are getting shorter,

I like to stay home now.

You’ve visited your graves already?

I have no graves. My wife deserted me a long time ago,

you know, my sons are alive, but far away,

in Canada, yes, Canada . . . I have no graves . . .

But what about your mother, your father, brothers, grandparents, where are they buried?

Over there, in the air over Auschwitz,

they’re buried in the air.

From Paris Review, No. 119, reviewed above. Translated from the Slovak by Jascha Kessler with the author. 1991 by Milan Richter.