Poklosie

Franciszek Kalina:
So, what made you do it?

J?zef Kalina:
Beats me. So many things aren't right, but we live with them anyway because there's nothing you can do about it. But I think that some things are more wrong than others. It's like, you see a guy lying drunk in the street, you walk on by, 'cause you think, "He's drunk," and you got your own problems and all. But when it's a child lying there, you just can't walk by. Understand?

Franciszek Kalina:
Go on.

J?zef Kalina:
The Germans destroyed that cemetery. I can't help that, I wasn't even born then. They paved the road with gravestones, now that's very wrong, but I didn't know about that either. It was only when folks started talking about covering up that old road with asphalt that I thought, "No way." At first I hoped the county would do something, but then I saw people driving up and down the road, all happy that it's nice and even.

Franciszek Kalina:
I understand all that, but why you? We never had anything to do with the Yids.

J?zef Kalina:
Beats me, I'm telling you I don't know why. It made me feel bad. I kept thinking, "This is wrong." What if someone tore up our parents' headstone and put it by the church door so folks wouldn't get their feet muddy?

Franciszek Kalina:
Joziu, but these are total strangers. They're not even our people. Not to mention they've been dead 100 years. Your family's alive. Why should they suffer because of some Jewish foolery?

J?zef Kalina:
I know it's wrong, but I had to do it.

Franciszek Kalina:
Jews in Chicago, I know what they're like... What was that about the church?

J?zef Kalina:
I found out that they laid some of the stones around the well.

Franciszek Kalina:
J?zek, don't even think about it.

J?zef Kalina:
Why not? The parish priest doesn't mind. He said I could take them away. That young priest's not too happy about it, but there's nothing he can do. The parish priest is on my side.

Franciszek Kalina:
Just don't do it.

J?zef Kalina:
It's wrong, don't you see?

Franciszek Kalina:
It'll end in tears, I'm telling you. What about those lumberjacks, huh? Think they beat you up for no reason?

J?zef Kalina:
Come on, that was about soccer. They wanted to know who I root for.

Franciszek Kalina:
So you went and said Maccabi Tel Aviv.

J?zef Kalina:
They were drunk and looking for a fight is all.

Franciszek Kalina:
[gets up from the table and holds J?zef's face in his hands] Why should you, of all people, care about their dead?

J?zef Kalina:
Well, you know, there's no one left to look after them.