An old man with eyes like dead sparrows
is telling a story at the next table
in the restaurant of the Quality Inn
in Lebanon, Pennsylvania, something
about the price of scrap metal after the war.
Suddenly he lowers his voice. The Jews,
he mumbles. My wife and I look at each other.
Meat hooks. Gas chambers.
Our daughter notices. What? she asks.
I shake my head. We finish eating
and go up to our $74-a-night room
and all lie on one bed and watch TV.
The studio audience is laughing.
“One Night Stay” was printed in Esther, No. 1 of Inwood Indiana. Pick up the paperback from Prolific Press; the stories and poems published online are free to read here.
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