In My Father-in-Law's Study

My father-in-law introduced me to Yehuda Amichai.

I have never met him, my father-in-law, the man for whom my son is named. He died two years before my husband and I went on our first date. His study is almost exactly as he left it -- the desk, the computer, the music in the CD changer. It is understood that nothing is to be touched -- except for the books, which we may borrow. He was a librarian; he would have wanted it that way.

When I leafed through the yellowed copy of Yehuda Amichai's Poems, translated by Assia Gutmann, my mother-in-law was quick to say, "Take it. Keep it." So, at least for now, it is on my shelf. I have read it and reread it.

Another of his books, too, is on my shelf. When I started college, e.e. cummings was one of my favorite poets. I knew he had written one novel, but I was never able to get my hands on a copy. And then, years later, in my father-in-law's study, I saw it: The Enormous Room.

On their first date, my father-in-law read poetry to my mother-in-law.

. . . Not a sign will remain that we were in this place. / The world closes behind us, / The sand straightens itself.

(From Yehuda Amichai's "Like Our Bodies' Imprint")

I've never met the man who read these books. But when I sit on the leather couch in his study, my fingers touching the pages he turned, I wish that I had.