We’d wait eagerly
Like kids
At a candy store
For Aba to take us to Shul
We always entered:
Late.
My father
Never one to
Bow to propriety
He would go
Straight
To his father
Who sat enshrined In his tallis
In the center
My brother and I
Go right
Hugging the walls
Packed with Siddurim, chumashim, and volumes of Tanya
But we’d pass them
On our pilgrimage
To Milan
Who sat on the flanks
Old, slightly bent
A camp survivor
He would smile
And say Gut Shabbos
As he handed us each
A little rectangle
Of bubblegum
His sons sat next to him
His grandsons too
But we had eyes only
For his gift
In its armor of blue, white and red
Launching us
On our ascent
Much like
The little figure
On the front
Of the Bazooka
We now held
We’d open it
Reveal the small comic strip
Wrapped around
A blush of pinkness
Next was Max
Tall and straight
He didn’t say a word
As he extended his tallis bag
To show us
His rainbow of fizzers
But then he’d look and pause
To see we were two
Of his favorites
So he’d take
from his jacket pocket
Two longer fizzers
Only then would he smile
With a crisp
good shabbos
Before turning to the next
We’d then wrap around
In our S
And pass the bimah
To see Bruce
In a kasket and a jacket
His beard trimmed neatly
No tallis adorning
Who,
unlike the others
Hadn’t managed to lock down
An aisle seat
But that didn’t dissuade him
From lobbing his candies
Over the crowd
While the chazzan warbled
His smile
As he motioned readiness for the throw
Matching ours
His were my favorites
Yellow, white, green, orange, pink or red
Wrapped like a bow
In cellophane
Sweeter from
The joy of watching them
Soar through the air
Mr Raitman then would beckon
His offering
Of crisp pretzels
A slight disappointment
After the sugar
High
He’d pull a handful out
Of his velvet tallis bag
A golden pretzel
Embroidered
On its front
But he was most
Enthusiastic
And would shake our hands
And heartily say:
Good shabbos!
Our last stop
Was our Zaida
who would sit:
His tallis falling
From his shoulders
His eyes glued
To his siddur
As we shimmied
To our seats next to him
We’d say
good shabbos
And he’d give us our prize:
A lollipop
Packed with fizz
In early years he’d pull them
From his pocket
In later
From inside the shtender
We would then open our siddurim
As we ripped off the wrapper
And filled our mouths
As the shul filled with prayers
Ascending on high
But we were already there
High on sugar
And ready
For next week
Because these men
Would give one
And no more
One
And no more
Until next week
For one
And no more