MARGARET GIBSON

Chalk and Slate

Each week I wipe the slate
and wait, until
the wet sheen dulls
to a blur, then take chalk
like a school girl
and write the current week’s
comings and goings you find
hard to recall—
nothing special, just
scheduled moments,
a visit from friends or family
or to a doctor—
as you put it, this and that, this and that. 
You call events “positions” now,
and the word
also covers place and time. 
How much more time
will it take
to figure what our own
positions are?
I’m trying to be poised, and I’m trying
to fall apart,
I’d cry if I could. What stops me
is not the act
or erasure—not just yet—
but the wet black slate
in which
no face appears.