ABSTRACT
Years ago, I found myself, one morning, in a somewhat bewildered state on a bench in Park Poludnia in the Polish city of Wroclaw. It was a fine day, sunny but not too warm, and some well-nourished swans were cruising effortlessly on the little lake, a cuckoo was calling, and great plots of pansies, a flower that is to the Poles these days what the shamrock is to the Irish, were in bloom. I had not lost my way; in fact, I knew every little path in that splendid park. I could recall having sat on that very bench twenty-five years before, almost to the day, and listening to what may have been the grandparent of that cuckoo, but then it had been the Suedpark in the German city of Breslau. The city I had known has disappeared like Herculaneum or Pompeii (or as some may prefer, like Sodom and Gomorrah); many landmarks are still the same; the Oder still flows through the town and quite a few streets and buildings look exactly as they did a quarter of a century ago, but then I had parents, acquaintances, and friends in that city. Now, I did not know a soul.
