Moshe's Number

“4 1 3 1 2,” she read
the tattoo on his arm again,
sitting on her zayde's lap,
as Moshe with a crayon drew
on poster paper right to left
what Sarah said "looked almost like
the grass that grew in Central Park
my Mama Sunday took me to,
but that was green and this is black."

And when she asked her zayde what
the funny looking number was*
he said it was a secret one
that only God and Zayde knew,
which was the better half of truth
before he hugged her half to death.

*ארבעים ואחד אלפים שלוש-מאות שלושה-עשר