Free A Blessing on the Moon by Joseph Skibell Page B

probe the ground with the rubber tip of my stick, searching for the drop.
    By degrees, the dust settles, and small faces begin to appear behind its thinning veils. The Rebbe and I stand above them at the edge of the decline. Arms raised to block the day’s brightness, they bend their necks to look at us, thousands of ragged men and women, their darkcircled eyes blinking against the too-dazzling light. What a curious sight we must make, a tall, heavy man in a dark suit with a black crow perched upon his shoulder. But no less curious are they! Although the harsh winter seems to have slowed their decay, their milk-white bodies show evidence not only of rot, but also of mutilation. I recognize a face or two. It isn’t easy. The soldiers’ lime has eaten into their skins, gnawing deep rouged gashes into their chins, into their cheeks. Their arms, raised, leave black shadows slanting across their pale, disastrous features.
    But certainly there’s Reb Yudel the candlemaker. We nod to each other, a silent greeting, and I see that he’s missing an arm.
    With a dirty hand, Basha Rosenthal wipes a tear from a lost eye. Her child plays at her broken feet, without its jaw.
    Rivke Siedenberg, my old seductress, bravely holds her disemboweled viscera in with two unsteady arms.
    A man I can no longer identify uses two pincer-like fingers to delicately extract a worm from the cavity in his blackened cheek. He pulls and pulls at its slithering tail, curling it in loops around his little finger.
    “Reb Chaim!” he waves an arm at me. “Greetings!”
    My stomach heaves into my throat. I whistle through my teeth, sickened by the stench. I bring a handkerchief to my nose and attempt to nod in reply.
    The Rebbe leaves my shoulder and lands upon the arm of a thin man whose greenish skin shows through the tatters in his suit.
    “Rebbe?” the man squints through the thick rheum covering his eyes. “Is it really you?”
    Joy splits his cracked lips. His teeth are yellow and broken. Those near to him crowd in to be closer to the Rebbe. The greenish man raises the Rebbe, in two hands, for all to see.
    “Ah,” he happily drools. “What a wonderful world indeed!”

22
    I reach down, bending on my knees, and offer my hand to Reb Elimelech. He scrambles up the side, clinging to my lowered arm. On his feet now, he brushes a colorless hand through the tangles of his long and silvery beard, combing crumbly balls of dirt and frantic insects from inside it. We look into each other’s unbelieving faces, our hands clamping onto each other’s arms, and soon we are hugging and weeping and laughing all at once, although, pressed in against his chest, I can’t help noticing how rotten and decomposed he smells!
    I struggle to escape his grip, but it’s useless. He’s too excited to see me.
    “Will you look at you, old friend!” he shouts, his arms around me like a vise. “Chaimka!” Mercifully, he holds me now at arm’s length for a better look, grunting. “So they shot you in the back of the head, did they?”
    I choke out the words, “Yes, and through my belly and chest as well.” I slip away from him and stand at a distance, as if to demonstratemy wounds. But even at this remove, his stench is overpowering. “Later,” I say, “in private, I’ll show you the holes.”
    He nods, grimly.
    “And you, Reb Elimelech?”
    “Through the heart, I think,” he probes a nervous hand into his sunken breast. “I’m not certain. It’s been so dark, I couldn’t check.”
    All about us, the prisoners have shaken off their lethargy. Prayers are whispered, thanks is loudly offered up. Their confusing freedom overtakes them in its rush. Everyone tries to climb out of the grave at once. Children scramble up its uneven slopes, against their parents’ wishes. A rope is fashioned out of shirts and pants, and various ones fight to be the first to climb it.
    “One at a time!” “Out of my way!” “Stop pushing, you!”
    Holding on to Reb