Other than menorahs
and Torahs
Art at a museum, its galleries, seen from remote backsides
gawking, standing, scratching; security guards’ perspective,
their
paid-to-stand attention, openings and closings, all doors
locked. Home.
Orderliness prevails, exhibits ebb and flow, precedents to sift
and weave,
to recycle as collections, generational artifacts, familiar evidence
as dust from ancient graves, of ancestral permanence.
But I am my own museum, my art traced from scattered remains,
untenable
provenance; I am a Jew with scrolls of faith, wall hangings
of prayers,
remnants of synagogues, fragmented tombstones,
small museums; we Jews don’t need much space. Thousands of
years cast
as tracks in sand, paths well known to those who chased us. We
carried
what we could, parted with art left behind, vanished.
Mine won’t be. It’s hidden in my children’s hearts to cherish
when that
impulse calls them to see shapes and signs their blood pours
into
as I back away and leave them, keys to my museum.
B.Koplen 5/14/13
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