Dry scratches, bare traces 
screeching against the paper,
lengthening, leaning on each other,
then changing directions. 
Filling the white with some black
carried by liquid grey hazes of matter,
flecks and clots of metallic brilliance
with almost the substance of a body
pressing its bulk against the white, 
a dividing line, blue with
infinite feathery striations

She wiped out the old face,
tiny dots erasing traces of the past,
rain blotting, blotting each stroke,
undoing, baring the heartbreak, 
to paint, she thought,
is to erase, turned sideways,
erasures that give depth
to life, a palimpsest