by Beth Kanter

            here

The word echoed throughout the ship eventually finding Anna in the windowless bowel of the boat. It stirred something in her. Something she thought was as dead as her husband whose diseased corpse had been tossed overboard during the crossing.

            On deck, Anna saw it true. Land had been spotted. Not just any land. American land. New York land. Di goldene medina land. Not imagined land. Not ocean land. Not home, land. Not pogrom land. Here, land.

            here

            Other truths also emerged. 

            An enormous creature, brownish green, appeared through the dense fog. It showed itself in flashes, the way a lightning storm illuminates the night. A finger, a long nose, a toe. Anna thought it must be the journey and her mind playing tricks on her. It appeared again, and again. Each time revealing itself for a heartbeat longer than the last. A neck and a head. An eye. And, after that, what Anna believed was a crown. 

            Had her husband come back to life as a sea monster, clawing his way to America on the ocean floor? Did death and saltwater give him the strength and height and growl and build he never had in life like one her mother’s stories about dybbuks? Was he seeking revenge on the sailors who threw him overboard? On her for not giving him a proper burial?

            The culprit was not a spirit or a ghoul or even the angry ghost of her dead husband, but a woman.

            here

            She told the creature.

            I  

            am

            here

            The being took up more space than any woman, or person for that matter, she had ever encountered. Others on deck must have thought so, too. Most of the men moved toward the side of the ship to drink her in. Anna imagined them swallowing the lady whole. How the woman’s silhouette would bulge out against the skin of their bellies. As they attempted to digest her, the ship tipped, perhaps from the weight of their expectations. Not wanting to be the first one in the water should it plunge, the young widow walked herself to the other side of the vessel and grabbed the railing where a few other women stood, the ones who were not quieting children or packing up below deck.

            here

            A woman her mother’s age told Anna as she made space for her at the railing.

            stand

            with    

            us

            here

            Anna held on as she watched the men take off their hats, flapping them above their heads. A little boy danced a jig. Grown men joined him. They sang and clapped. One by one the women crossed to the other side of the deck to join them. The mother woman left last without saying goodbye.

            here

            how did she get

            here?

            The ship shifted and slowed before turning its hull ever so slightly, changing the young and alone woman’s vantage point. Anna’s opened her mouth as wide as her eyes. She didn’t have words for this moment. Instead she made a noise the shape of a circle.

            Regal and insignificant Anna lifted her neck like the great lady. She steadied her feet imagining she too was wrapped in billowing fabric instead of her stained and stinking clothes. She held her bundles at her side, one hers and the other her dead husbands, with the same purpose the woman carried her book. Imagining a crown of spikes and wisdom heavy on her head, she raised her arm to the sky. She longed to feel the weight of a stone torch in her own clutched fingers. Her conquering limbs tingled. Her mild eyes commanded. Her silent lips yearned.

            Then the sound of laughter found her. The crew was pointing at her. Mocking her. Ready to feast again, the dancing men joined. She tasted the ocean’s salty spray.

            Unwilling to be consumed, the newest American woman lowered her arms. She looked up at the statue grateful neither of them knew what came next for the other. Anna set down her imaginary flame, broadened her stance, and threw off her crown. She let go.