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Memory

Memory

Oh mysterious memory

Why do I re-member you?

Why do I only re-member

Some of you

Hidden, fogotten boxes

Once unwrapped

Revealing a universe before?

That one taste…

That one specific sound…

That touch…

Forevermore, inscribed

Why?

Why do you stay?

Why do you linger?

Do you wait, embedded

For us to return?

To re-live

To heal

To release?

Memory

Oh mysterious memory

Do you wait for us

To collectively review

To see the old story

Perhaps ones laden in bone

To reflect

And to re-write?

Or are you simply

A leftover echo

Of primal survival mechanics

What to avoid

What to draw near

How to keep safe

How to

Attack

Memory

Oh mysterious memory

Why do we re-member you?

Why do we only re-member some of

You

Hidden, fogotten boxes

Once unwrapped

Revealing a universe before?

Teach me

Oh mysterious memory

Of why

You stay

A Sense of Comfort, Part One

Soft mound melting roof of mouth

Vanilla cream trickling throat

Chilled silver resting lip

Beastmaster and misty swaying pines

Electric green moss carpet beneath hand

Arranging mushrooms, leaves for tiny folk

Croaking of gulls at seashore

Lighthouse moans in fog

Fingers squishing anemone

Coffeemate crumbles dissolve across tongue

Kitty fur, purring

Closed bedroom doors, horror pages turning

Crisped edges salty potatoes

Glistening crackles lemon chicken pan

Forest nooks and fortresses, wild onion and sorrel crunching

Warm sun bakery window scone

Early morning farmer’s market bustle, auntie’s basket heavy

Echoing awe gregorian chant episcopal stained glass sunbeams

A quiet night, safety

Schoolwork structure, pencil scribbling

Strumming cardboard guitars, mommy’s black knee high boots

Vampire bites from neighbors

Mommy, sleeping, working

Mommy not screaming

Mommy not grieving

Mommy not drinking

Mommy not self-destructing

Weight watchers rules, measuring cups

Empty stomachs

Substitute psychiatric mothers

Concerns in eye

His kiss

The auric field of wolf protector

Gooey pancakes, assigned and accompanied

He who fights for me

His arms holding in sweaty roiling pit

Mildewy stone wood cabin shower

Marie Callender flaky pot pie crust, juicy chunks gravy

Walking, forever

Disappearing

Admittance

Being forced to eat

White, bleached linens

Being sick enough

Low blood pressure readings, dizzy

Cafeteria coffee smells

Treatment team “not ready” declarations

Ensure, ice cubes bobbing, slowly straw slurping

Watered down amazingness hitting tongue

After crossing fasting abyss

Someone to take care of me

Someone to protect me

From Her

Feeling not alone with it

After so many years a parent-child

Hope

Veggie burger patty melted cheese

Cafeteria privileges, grown up coffee drinking

Crazy talks with other crazy birds

Twisted tribe

Worry in whitecoat eyes

Another admittance

Safety

For awhile

Not having to fight Her

For awhile

Hope

That this time’s the last

Rain Memories

Ironically

I don’t remember rain

All throughout my childhood years

The first drop

The first torrential storm

The element that might have given me solace

In such turbulent cesspools of emotion

Not a trace.

However

The first memory that does occur

Peeking up through layers of dutiful barrier

Is that night I cared for him

The soon to be dead man

In a garage

Soothing, comforting

Evanescent beast

Drip dropping

Water flowing, framing

This glowing palace.

Comes the one

My frail hand

I’ve frozen it, bony, in time

Against window

It is waiting in cold fall

Drip dropping

Outside this glowing psychiatric facility

Cold silence and desperation

Between me and her

Waiting

Drip dropping

Hoping

I’m sick enough.

Muninn the Memory

Delivers another

Of harried, frustrated

Obsessive sweaty efforts

Running through collegial redwoods

Drip dropping

Towering canopies

Too crazed to notice

Running from

And towards

My secret undoing.

Funny that

The next one he delivers

Drip drops

Into mind

Are sequential flashes:

Swollen cabin gulleys

Hawaiian A-frame mesh

Walls piercing winds wet chilled skin

Crashing violence on black razor edges

Tool howling.

All of soggy Portland

Is just a blur

Why?

Why is that, mystery of Memory?

Years later

Another arrives

Ironically enough

A garage

Only this time I’m the one tended

Teetering on the edge

Wooed back by wizard

Chaos on floors

Sawdust on frames

Creating.

A drizzle

Outside ye olde bohemian cart

The turkish coffee served

He sits under the umbrella

Anubis and soft glow framing

Wind whistling

Fairy lights sparkling

Drip

Dropping.

Downed power lines

Rivers wild

Refusing to stay off imaginary cement borders

Fear rising as wheels skid

Submerged

Drip

Dropping

Wipers sloshing

Blurred anxiety

Breath and prayers.

And then

They are gone

I rack my brain

The bird does not deliver much more

So I sit back in wonder

At why these ones

And only these ones

Remain

Oh liquid droplets

Condensed from atmospheric vapor

Why is it only these I remember of you

Such power and beauty

So many days of my life

Rain

Why does the bird deliver

Such sparse notes

Of our relation

Of our

Rain memories