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--- E L I   G O L D B L A T T


That piano behind us, with menorah & teapot set on top, hems us in as we finish our meal. I wear a cream linen peasant-style shirt on my wedding day. You wear the narrow outfit suitable for a bubbe at the wedding of her dead son's son. The food is decidedly kosher, but later you'll throw it up in the bushes

just discreetly enough that only my mother's brother will see you retching. At this moment your amused frown's simply a part of the scene like the table cloth laid on the rented table. Left hand in my lap, the right halfway to my face, perhaps I'm turning to go greet other guests. That marriage did not outlive you. Thin stripes in my shirt match

the lines on your dress. We each stare off at different points just outside the frame of this photo; both of us wear dark-rimmed unfashionable glasses, tho yours are bifocals like mine now. I've set my knife on the empty plate's edge.

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