forgotten

March 24, 2023

RADIOACTIVE

I cannot say for certain which day
I became the familial isotope,
but I know my parents began
accreting neutrons not long
after their marriage, bound
to their mutual core, unbound
from me, adopted into the family,
and I then became the isotope
of the family but remote,
easily enough forgotten,
when I was not present.
That is, I suppose, one possible
fate for an isotope, it’s familial
half-life up and then forgotten.

But perhaps it was just
that I was the family’s
Schrödinger’s cat, finally put
in a box into which
no one chose to look.

September 2, 2022

THE FATES HAVE IT

It was a chance meeting they thought
although the Fates knew otherwise.
Theirs was a subtly planned world,
leave no fingerprints, always have
an alibi, better still never get caught.

It was a short meeting, a brief
conversation and an ill-meant
promise to stay in touch, numbers
exchanged and as soon forgotten.

He never imagined calling,
nor did she, but he did call
and they did meet again,
and the Fates smiled as
the couple celebrated
their golden anniversary,
both still certain it was all
a simple matter of chance.

July 21, 2022

FORGOTTEN SOULS

From the heart of the inferno
Dante and Lucifer grow bored
waiting, waiting for the ferry
while Charon stops for lunch
yet again at a Greek diner
in the heart of Hell’s Kitchen.
They take up a game of catch
tossing Molotov cocktails,
raining fire onto the brimstone,
setting the Styx ablaze.
Each knows this is not necessary,
for necessity is a creature
of heaven and there is no room
for the extraneous here
in the realm of forgotten souls.
We watch from deep within
a nightmare of our darkest
memories, certain that heaven
must await us, or purgatory
if that is how our fate
is to finally be written.
The angels dance on the ceiling
waiting for the precise moment
to break Morpheus’ grasp
and drag us back to our reality,
to continue our dance
between heaven and hell.

First published in Fresh Words Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 3, June 2022
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1G9eVgBt1ZS1syN9RruNQLzt7-JVq04sY/view

July 3, 2022

LUNA’S SONG

Tonight, when the sun
has finally conceded the day
to its distant but ever larger kin,
the moon will again sing
her ever waning song
hoping we will join
in a chorus we have
so long forgotten,
bound to the earth
in body and in waxing thought.

We will stop and listen
perhaps, over the din
of the city, the traffic,
the animals conversing
with the sky, our thoughts,
but the words will now
be an alien language
for which we have
no dictionary, only
the faint memory
of the place from which
both we and the moon
share cosmic ancestry.

March 8, 2022

SHADOW

I want to be your shadow,
and not in your shadow,
but the shadow itself,
so that I might be with you,
often unnoticed, forgotten
but present in the light
of day and night.

It is a closeness
I deeply want, without
intruding, a presence
you have with you always,
for that is what lovers
crave in silence, something more
for which they dare not ask.

November 10, 2021

NOT COUNTING

I have had two,
although the first is long
forgotten, so perhaps it
no longer counts, it
certainly didn’t to her,
announcing its end
like the conductor
of a train running late
on the mainline to sadness.

Perhaps I have not forgotten
but all I see is myself
standing alone, intoning
words to which the crowd
intently listens, much like
the audience at a reading
by a lesser known poet,
feigned polite awareness.

I’ll just say I’ve had one
for it is easier that way
on all three parties.

October 27, 2021

RECYCLED NEWS

The newspapers pile up,
their headlines scream
out, sections of business news
or the arts, and a half
completed crossword.,

They sit patiently, knowing
much has happened that we
ought to know, but we
have grown tired of death
and so each week we

place them in the bin
where they are taken
to the dump where
the lessons of the news
go to die forgotten.

August 30, 2019

NIGHT MOTHER

The night closes in
chasing the sun, dragging
heavily laden clouds that stare
down, watching warily for us
to step outside without glancing skyward.
Clouds of night are particularly jealous,
most often ignored if not
completely forgotten, unsure which
would be worse, ultimately indifferent.
As we begin the walk to the car
the clouds open, a torrential reminder
that Mother Nature
will not be easily ignored.

July 27, 2019

THE BURDEN

We are obligated to carry
memories, and as we
get older the burden grows
ever heavier, we bend
under its weight, knowing
we dare not lose even one
for once castoff, the weight
is carried off like the smallest
feather on a storming wind.
Soon enough it is we
who will become the burden
that others must carry
and we hope they will
willingly shoulder the load
lest we become the excised
dust of forgotten stone
grown over with weeds.