Memory

Memory, Memory
Dangling
Inches beyond my fingertips
Elusive and Taunting
Carrot and stick
I can not reach

Fading Fading
Bit by bit,
Byte by byte,
By the year and the decade
Details, names
Anecdotes never shared that now never will be
Blotted from recollection
Like moth holes in an old gray sweater
Fissures gnawed into old grey matter
I'd assumed was intact
Until I reached into the closet
Pulled it from deep in a drawer
And held up to the light
The tales of my youth
My coming of age
My glory days
Now threadbare
Torn
Unraveling

Wishing Wishing
I'd written, photographed, journaled
Recorded those details I once wished to forget,
Mundane, humiliating.
Endless hours riding the school bus,
Fidgeting through church,
Driver's education.
First awkward kiss, first hopeless crush, first little league ballgame strikeout,
Once painfully obvious
Easily recalled
Now forgotten as an everyday dream
Lost to the ether.

Grasping Grasping
Far too young for decaying faculties
Stored naively
Without mothballs
In a sturdy steel sieve.
At least I remember these past years
Adult years
Career and family years
Or do I?
Old colleagues and students, in time, begin to blur together into this type or that type.
Names familiar but no longer known
Semesters, Years of relationship
Reduced to a vibe
A glimmer.
An uncertain Hey-do-I-know-you
That I'm afraid to ask,
Because I know that they'll know me.

Memories, memories
Unable to lock away
What I still have
This vapor drifting across my palm
Brushing past arthritic fingertips
Knowing I could reach each one
Could grasp it
And hold on
If only I was a year younger
If only I'd worked harder at it.
Wishing I could stretch these hands that
One last inch.