I lift the wine to my lips,

l'chaim--

and drink to life my father's

death, twenty years

of ugly death

the wine his blood,

drained before they buried him,

before the reading

of the Kaddish--

words they would not

let me say beside

the hollow comfort of his grave--

Kaddish came from men

so daughters didn't

count--

twenty years later I begin to count

yisgadal, v'yiskadash, yisbarach,

v'yishtabach...

I lift the wine to my lips,

l'chaim.