The Box

by Max Kaufman

 

          LOVE YOU
          MAX!
          Happy Passover -we will
          miss you lots. Some
          matza crack, homemade
          macaroons, jellies, onion
          matza & horseradish (dip it?)
          for you.
          XOXO,                          see you         
                     Mom                        soon!

I read the letter after
I opened the box, scissors
ripping, four times. I unpacked

each item wrapped, carefully
held each, turned each, reading mem
tzadit hei, like it might crack.

I laid them out on my bed.
And do you know what, a song
of renewal played out loud.

I would shake the tambourine
but I was back in the box.
I laid me down in the box.

I asked someone, Elijah,
to pack it all again and
send it all back home. Tape shut.

Cardboard becomes holding;
the memories in its brown.
I open my eyes and read.

          LOVE YOU who would sit with me
          in the box, where we can talk
          about words on wrapped paper

          MAX! towels—names—tucked away
          like Happy Passover is
          tucked away, like the folded
         
          table added to stretch out
          -we will sit there, but we won’t
          always listen—like how we

          miss some story to stretch our
          legs to clear the china bowls,
          or you want more? you’ve had lots.,

          but of course there’s more, because
          Some nights are different from
          all other nights where matza

          isn’t, or matzo isn’t,
          or matzah isn’t—crack the
          word open to find stories

          of families, of homemade
          words, of times told soft grown soft
          from grandmother macaroons lips,

          jellies open into more
          glow, stories of stories onion-
          skinned over, like all the coats

          thrown on the bed, hung on racks
          before matza crumbs can get
          to them & snuggle in for

          years, unnoticed behind the
          tears, laughter, horseradish red
          and white faces that you look

          at all night, for good and bad,
          taking in all they feel and
          (dip it?) feeling it too or

          sharing in how this all does,
          for you., make you feel repaired,
          Xrepaired, O made anew,
          Xmade anew, O closer,

          so you can see what you need
          which so often is just your
          Mom or Dad or Brother or

          Sister or Grandparent or
          Cousin or Aunt or Uncle
          or friend—someone who could send

          you a box to be opened,
          who could sit with you inside—
          someone who will send it soon!

I read the letter after
I opened the box, and I
had opened the box again.

 

 

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