Man and wife, my ancestors,
stand in front of the leafless hedge
that protects the small plot they work.

Germany, Russia, or Poland,
I am not sure of their country.
But I almost see their breath.

This picture hung in the parlor,
near where the piano had been.
During WWII my father

could have played Paderewski’s
Minuet in G for them,
for their picture, for their ghosts.

I don’t remember the stories
my grandfather told of Poland,
just the story of him, a boy

crossing barren, not yet bloody
fields, cutting and eating slices
of raw turnip, his candy.
He never talked about the ghosts.