I remember.
Do you?
I don’t remember every little detail.
How about you? Did it really happen?
It seems like it was so long ago.
It seems like it happened yesterday.
Was it real?
Did that really happen?
Do I have a right to these feelings when no one I know was hurt?
Died.
Scarred.
Or maybe they were.
Scarred I mean.
I think, no thought, I remembered it all.
As the years pass I question myself more.
And more.
Piecing bits together the jigsaw does not make sense.
The order of events.
The timeline next to mine.
I must be wrong.
I ‘know’ I saw one fall.
I know I did.
I think I must not.
Maybe it was a replay.
But ‘I know’.
I saw things that cannot be unseen.
Multiple media types.
Burned into my mind.
Never to be erased.
So few things burned so.
Two.
Both death.
And oral memories.
Imaginations of disgusting, brutal events.
Also etch into my mind.
Thank God these not visually.
Earth is a disgusting, horrific, traumatic place.
Accidents of birth deciding one’s fate.
Our planet is a beautiful, loving, awesome world.
Accidents of birth deciding one’s fate.
One.
Other.
Mix.
Varying degrees of both.
No yardstick for pain or misery.
No one’s greater than another.
So much greater. Lesser.
The dialectical truth.
No greater. No lesser. No equal. Bullshit.
Lost keys. Death.
Influeza. Cancer.
Casual boyfriend. Beloved husband. Gone.
Theft. Murder.
And on. And on.
Good and bad.
For all.
Unique cocktails.
Forced down our throats.
Sweet. Noxious.
Drink up.
Baby. Grandma.
Cocktails all around.
Ad infinitum.
One second of life.
One hundred years of life.
Missed flights.
Miracle cures.
Stranger’s save.
Buses walk in front of.
Door handles full of germs.
Second hand cigarettes.
Cosmic fate.
Chance.
It does not matter.
Birth.
Life.
Death.
Blink of an eye.
My eye.
Your eye.
His eye.
Her eye.
Our eyes.
So many eyes.
Blinking in unison.
Love.
Unstoppable.
Unbreakable.
Ha.
Ha.
Ha.
Breakable.
Give me a break.
Stop.
Stop it.
My mind is spinning.
Too, too fast.
Sluggishly.
The visual.
The orated.
Pushing deeper and deeper.
Never, ever forget.
In the words of my favorite poet:
I will arise and go now…
I have spoken my words.
Immutable.
Fickle.
I have vomited useless thoughts through my finger tips.
Piqued your curiosity.
Bored you to tears.
I apologized.
Conscience clear.
Did I provoke thought?
Are neurons firing?
Synapses passing along information?
Ideas – some remaining subconscious.
Others in plain view.
What conclusion will be yours?
Will you be as confused as me?
Crystal clear in your conviction?
The impossibility of that is obvious.
Maybe not to you.
If you overlook the glaring truth do I care for your opinion?
I judge.
If you are one of 2,996 do I have a right.
You have a right regardless. Irregardless.
He was there.
He is part of the memory.
How I love him now.
Plus ça change…
Yet things are not the same.
And never will be…
Time always marches on…
Running Half Empty 