Minna and her husband, who had no children, lived
in a semi-detached house on Rogers Avenue
down the road from me, next door to my friend
Arlene’s house. In memory, I confuse
Minna’s husband with Arlene’s father, Syl,
a Polish kosher butcher, since both men
sat summer evenings on their front porches
in white cotton singlets, their hairy arms
bare to any breeze. However warm,
the outside felt cooler than the kitchen
where Arlene’s mother, Gertrude, stood for hours
