Father Writes a Letter

Most Honored Herr Professor,
wrote my father, in German,
to his former teacher,
who had escaped to London.
It is March of 1939.
Father, Mother, and my infant self
had fled Vienna
for northern Italy. Decades later
this letter is in my hands. I recognize
my father's elegant European script,
struggle to decipher it and translate.
I write in the hope that
you can perhaps be helpful.
Reading these hand written words
for the first time
I am suddenly in the moment
of Father's desperation,
the effort of his polite restraint.
Filling the professor in
on his employment history
my father writes, I had to give up
the last two positions since I am
half Aryan [read half Jewish].
I am married, have a nine-month-old child
and hope from here on in
to have the possibility
of a new life. But the professor
could not help. His typed response
dated two months later
I have no trouble translating.

From Connecticut River Review, 2018. Copyright © 2018 by Felice Aull.
​All rights reserved.




 

On the Staircase

The first time I said yes to him
it was unspoken, just a nod
and he couldn't see my face.
He was a step above me
on the narrow metal staircase,
addressing the back of my head.
We teens were pouring down
to get to class, the bell  
dislodging us from lunch.
For weeks I'd seen him eyeing me
as I strode past him to buy soup.
I liked that he was watching.  

That day, he followed behind
gathering courage – as he told me
later – but only enough
to ask without looking.
And I, in a moony daze,
signaled yes, not missing a step,
not needing to see his face.

From Literature Today, vol. 5, 2016 
​Copyright © 2016 by Felice Aull.
​All rights reserved. 

Remainders

When I take my evening walk
I am slightly tipsy
from the wine I drank at dinner.
It is August. I want to capture
remaining daylight, feel
a sliver of relief
from daytime's swelter.
I am not afraid
of the looming thunderstorm.
Here in Manhattan, wires are buried
under the streets –
the power will not go off.
Not like those windy torrents of rain
in the Berkshires where
we were left in the dark
or drove to dinner white-knuckled,
dashing from the car
into a roadside restaurant.
In my walk now
I am immersed in those memories -
cool mountain evenings when
we walked after dining,
back and forth
in motel parking lots.
Tonight in New York
cicadas shrill their sound
from every clutch of trees
as if they and I
were in the country
and you were still alive.

From Evening Street Review, no. 23,
​Spring, 2020
Copyright © 2020 by Felice Aull
All rights reserved.
​