Psychoanalysis: The Magic and The Lie

Diary of a Five Day A Week Analysis

by  Esther Altshul Helfgott, Ph.D.

This page was last updated on: June 6, 2011

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January - March 1990

Transference 

Or My Analyst Has Curly Brown Hair

If I'm supposed to be

in a concentration camp

or dead, how is it

I'm here with you staring

into your hair wondering when

you'll let them cut it off again?

I hate when you cut your hair,

when you let them

tamper with your curls.  Hair,

twisted and coerced into wigs

after we're dead.

If we repulsed them,

how, then,

could they place Jewish curls

on their heads?

Can death be brushed out and combed?

Numbers carve themselves

into my arm.

Purple numbers.  Touch them.

Touch them.

         -Esther Altshul Helfgott

copyright1990,2005Esther Altshul Helfgott