Rewriting history

To the Tsar and his family, we say Sorry. The people of
Russia.
At the Church of the Blood
I look for Anastasia.
In the photographs, she stands with her sisters,
poised, posing for posterity.
I stand where she died, murdered in the night by the
Bolsheviks
so a revolution could happen.
Sometimes, what we choose is a hard road.
Now, the apology of the people
hangs, hopelessly, palpably, in dead air,
and Romanov’s memorial occupies a problematic place
in a new history.

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