Maxine Silverman

Palimpsest: Fez

for Ellen

For every teaching there is a language,
to give our stories a body and breath.
And for every absence there is a name.

In Fez we wandered out from the market,
the bartering, strong smells of spice and fish,
up and down narrow streets to find where

our guide told us Jews once lived. He’d pointed
toward what had been the Jewish graveyard,
headstones crushed to pave new neighborhoods.

Synagogue now home to a post office,
the Talmud Torah used for cinema,
quiet until the matinee at 2:00.

No Jews in Fez, not a sign, except doorposts—
faint traces where mezzuzot had been nailed,
their absence all that remains.

Collage, the Subtext

Words. Not that they fail. Rather serve too well.
I know precisely who I long for. Whom?
My heart cannot bear to say what my hands tell.

Shape, color, texture, heft — these comfort me.
I lay them out in a cool-quiet room.
Words. Not that they fail. Rather serve too well.

The surface of things is all I can see
or want to see — not cradle, nor tomb.
My heart cannot bear to say what my hands tell.

Arrange. Rearrange. What else could they be?
Meaning is swept out with memory’s broom.
Words. Not that they fail. Rather serve too well.

Without memory, all meaning floats free —
vague traces in dust, the shade of perfume.
My heart cannot bear to say what my hands tell.

Glue stick, glue gun — adhering is key.
Without memory, meaning cannot loom.
Words. Not that they fail. Rather serve too well.
My heart cannot bear to say what my hands tell.