You’ve been
thinking of memories
Of a place that
you’ve been –
A place that,
unfortunately,
You’ll likely
never get to again.
Little flashbacks,
you’re having,
Of inconsequential
things.
Walking out of a
grocery store off main,
Down the road from
construction, and doors.
It’s dancing in a
living room one night
On a faded brown
carpet
With a large singed
portion
Which the Elders
burned before your time.
It’s mounting a
snow heap,
Feeling victorious
in heavy snow boots,
Laughing through
wind blowing sideways
Just before a dinner
appointment.
It’s feeling your
fleece lined leggings
Underneath your
skirt,
Remembering the
feeling of heavy socks
Worn over top, and
up the calf.
It’s a cathedral
on a hill,
Dinner in an Indian
restaurant,
Waiting in line at a
Subway,
Discovering Bulk
Barn for that first time.
Buying stamps and
looking at cards
Down the road from
the poutine joint.
Seeing the weather
broadcasted in Celsius
To the apartment
lobby in the morning.
It’s eating lunch
under that tree.
It must have been a
Saturday,
Because there were
no kids at the school.
We took our shoes
off. I wanted to cry.
It’s that
centipede we found in our apartment.
That frog I caught
in my scripture case.
Our umbrella
flipping upside down in the rain,
And our running back
for home and the car, laughing.
It’s that
conversation with that bus driver.
It’s that first
day emailing home in the library.
It was discovering a
new city,
And pushing cars out
of snowbanks.
It’s that vague
recollection of ringing a buzzer
To see if someone
was home.
They weren’t. We
left.
But I remember
ringing that buzzer.
These are memories
that I cannot share.
No one will know
The places that I
have been.
The feelings that I
have had.
I long to visit the
places of the past,
Though I fear that
this longing
Will never be
satiated,
As I will never be
right there again.
It will never be
quite the same.
I realized this in
the middle of the night.
A crying baby needed
me.
A bottle was given.
A diaper needed
changing.
I placed him on a
changing table
And stretched, my
hands to the ceiling.
He stretched too,
An exact mirror
image of me.
I will never be here
again.
These moments no
camera will record.
The moments that
open your eyes,
When you experience
things deeply.
My past is just
that. My own.
It will never be
known.
I can show you the
streets, but to you,
They will only be
fresh, new things.
I can’t show you
my heart.
I can’t show you
the fog that rolled in.
How surreal it was
when I wrote it
In a dark room,
under its immaterial glow.
They are memories of
moments.
They are unknowable,
but to me.
The longing ache I
feel for that past
Can never be fully
redeemed.
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