CHEVY CHASE DC
- CHEVY CHASE DC
The covenants ran with the land,streams of a river gone undergroundto sustain the grantor's warrant of value—no Negroes no Semites permitted forever—until, a score of years before I moved in,a shift of justice dammed up that flow.
When I declared myself it made almosta queer coming-out—"I always thought youthe very essence of a WASP"—for a guywell past six feet, with light brown straight hair,blue eyes, fair skin, surname not one of thoseGerman monikers that hereabouts finger a Jew.
But I bought into the tract well afterI ceased to be banned. I am bound to wonderwhether I would have wormed my way in,for my piece of land submerging my taint,no mensch, to fool them into letting me buywhile letting them think they kept their value.
A fountain still honors the founder.The synagogue sits across a border street. [End Page 116]
James Toupin is a retired general counsel of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. He teaches in American University's law school. His poetry has appeared widely in journals, including Virginia Quarterly Review (online), Beloit Poetry Journal, and Nimrod. He is translator of Selected Letters of Alexis de Tocqueville on Politics and Society.
