Erasure, by Judith J. Katz

Untitled, by Cy Twombly (USA) 1967

Erasure
                 
Whatever the last message was
it has been erased and replaced with 
repetitive symbols of chaos. 
 
Triangles upon rectangles.  A formula
of empty boxes, scratched out
and silently slipping through space. 
 
Or perhaps they are running away
from the scene of a horrific accusation. 
 
Someone can read 
these hieroglyphs
but it is not me.
 
People ask me daily--
What do you think?
How do you feel?
 
I am despondent over what has been
lost—can never be recovered.
 
I think of what you have done
and it is not within my power to 
know the truth, heal the rifts, 
forgive your trespasses, 
repair your community.
 
This is not a blackboard. it is 
a painting of one; oil on canvas. 
Permanently affixed--
there is no erasing it
or what you have done.

Judith J. Katz

Judith J. Katz is the Lead Teacher for Creative Writing at the Cooperative Arts and Humanities Magnet High School in New Haven, Connecticut, where her signature courses focus on writing poetry. Ms. Katz’s work has been published in The Muddy River Poetry Review, Crossing Class Anthology, 101 Jewish Poems for the New Millennium Anthology, Months to Years, The Literary Nest, Ritualwell, The Raven’s Perch, The New Sound Literary Journal, Of Sun and Sand, and Sending Our Condolences. She has been a first runner up in the Kind of a Hurricane Press’s Editor’s Choice Awards and recently won a NEH award to study Emily Dickinson.