We have train tickets

to get from Germany to France.

We have ship tickets

to get from France to America.

What we don’t have—

still—

can you guess?

Father tells us all we must

dress in our good clothes,

whatever has not been packed and sealed,

and come downtown with him—

me, Mother, and Ruth.

We take the streetcar

and soon we are at the American consulate,

the building where the visa people work—

only the consulate is closed.

But Father sees the American officials inside,

so he pounds and pounds on the locked door

until someone comes.

He seems to recognize Father,

and lets us in.

We go upstairs,

upstairs, upstairs,

upstairs,

to the man’s office.

He is not a mean man,

the American official,

but he looks at some papers

and tells Father,

“Not yet.”

Not yet are there visas for us.

“Maybe next week.”

And my father, he explodes!

“Not yet? Next week?

Next week the Nazis could arrest us,

make us disappear,

like our neighbors!

There may not be a next week for us!”

And my father

walks over to the window

of the man’s office.

Father opens the window.

It’s cold outside;

we don’t need fresh air.

But this isn’t about fresh air.

As Father looks down to the sidewalk,

far below,

below, below

below this nice office,

he tells the surprised American official

that if he must wait longer for visas,

he might as well jump out the window.

“I might as well jump,”

Father tells the man,

“because the Nazis will be

murdering me soon anyway.”

The American official looks at us.

Is he noble, helpful, and good?

No, Vati, don’t jump!