| <- Back to main page
|
||
by Richard Horvath
Mrs. Nemeth fusses
with her black felt hat
she wants it just right
for the camera to catch.
She's dressed in her Sunday best
the down-to-the-ankles button up dress
for cousin Laszlo and his new Kodak.
Beside her is Mr. Nemeth
a small man wearing
a brown fedora and a large
Austro-Hungarian mustache.
Behind them the flower garden
gives off a rich
fragrance of geraniums
on this summer Sunday afternoon
Plaintive sounds
from a gypsy violin drift
through the kitchen screen door
from the radio station
that features Magyar folk music
on Sunday afternoons.
But she can't stop worrying that hat
angling it this way and that
teasing the clipped-on velvet bow
now to the front now to the back.
She wants it to look just right
on this day of rest.
Tomorrow it's off to Bridgeport
to the butcher on Kossuth Street
Tuesday it's wash the jars for canning pears
Wednesday in the cellar by the coal bin
with washboard and wringer
and shirts and sheets to iron
and Thursday—
Thursday nephew Alex arrives from Budapest.
But this afternoon
she lifts the netted veil
from her eyes
folds it back
and smiles into the sun.
Ready? asks cousin Laszlo—
Wait says Mrs. Nemeth
and she gives the hat
one last light touch—
OK she says—'Kesz vagyok'
Thirty years later
she lifts from a shoebox
a black and white photo
cracked and curled
showing a young woman
by a flower garden.
The photo pleases her
It pleases her
especially the tilt
of that black-veiled hat.