BUT NOT...

I've got a damn good memory,

and an even better imagination.

Makes it worse, because when 

I close my eyes and remember,

I don't want to open them again...

I can still hear the sounds of our

favorite restaurant, blush at all

the times you tricked my naivete,

ride the waves under my surfboard,

and still feel your thigh across

my middle, but when I roll over

to cop a little snuggle, you,

milady, like everything else,

are there no more.

Reviews

[Lorry]

I have a pretty good remembory too, ori did have until lockdown done something completely forgettable to it.
But every now and then the old remembory jukebox flicks on a random hit from the ether that makes me want to turn inside out and disappear up my own as...bellybutton!
Remembering someone gone from your daily view can turn the most diligent of minds into an old pre-dialup Atari, which we all thought was the future in the back now then.
We once flew to the moon with the computing capacity of a calculator, when we should have been trying to harness the superpower of memories random jukebox of despair. Every track was guaranteed no good for what ails ya.

[Vol]

Lorry,
Man, you write good reviews! I think our capacity for remembering the negative things must be how we survived the days of Sabertoothed Tigers, and quicksand and river undercurrents, and the location of that tribe two hills to the north. What we're left with is this dark, hungry part of our brains that stash away all our stupidities, so they are rarely poignant, just depressing...
Vol

[Lorry]

And it gets even worse Vol. The amount we misremember is enough to send us loopy. Just tell a tale in a room with friends and family and see their eyebrows turn into question marks as you tell them a memory so crystal clear in your mind but no doubt someone will remember it differently.
It was covered in a documentary called THE MIND, WITH DAVID ENGELMAN (or it might be Engelman)
I'm one of the 6 parts people spoke about what they remember about 9/11 of all things, which must be deemed unforgettable, especially to us citizens, but then they analysed the data and found ove 60% of people got major facts wrong, like the way the smoke was billowing and buildings being in the way of their view.
The reason given for this was that we have our memories but seeing what we saw on live TV authenticated and over-rode our own memories and imprinted TV as fact and vice versa, forever muddying the true picture.
The only flaw I found I'm the documentary was each episode was only 20 minutes long, so couldn't really do a deep dive in that time.
Still worth a watch though and has the added bonus of having Emma Stone narrating... or did just imagine that? 😃

[Vol]

Interesting Begs the question," Is it possible that my only reality is my memories... I tend to dress them up in nicer clothes and perfect weather. For example, on November 22, 1963, I was on the school bus in Pensacola, Florida when we heard that JFK had been shot... Pensacola is often referred to as "L.A." or Lower Alabama. It was a very racist place and Kennedy's notion of the Equal Rights Amendment, did not go over very well and some of the kids on the bus cheered. We the funeral, from our couch... my father, the Iwo Jima Marine was sitting straight with a tear rolling down his cheek. Clear as day... no idea how I've dressed that up... I am sure Walter Cronkite and all the others ran the replays, but I had not yet reached that cusp of awareness to understand the full import of any of it.
But that's the thing about memories, You can do with them anything you want... for many years, I told everyone that our horse had been named Dynamite, until my brother said it was "Blaze" I'm the eldest, so I guess I had more time to forget...
Vol

[Lorry]

If only we wrote memories like stories, we'd all have best selling memoirs coining in the cash! 😃
My brother always said when I was young I was convinced he was a replacement brother because the first one talked too much. I think I meant it was to shout him up but I'm still waiting for that to happen.
It does help that I changed my address without informing anyone, as well as my cell number and emails, but some people do get fond of their families... most likely because they aren't my family! 😃

[Kelly Scheppers]

I loved the descriptions you've given, Vol. ...the sounds of a favorite restaurant, the waves under your surfboard. The memories we have of sleeping with someone is as delible as they come. They are imprints upon our soul that never wash away, that make it so hard for us to live with eyes wide opened.

[Vol]

Kelly,
what you say is true... I have to have keep ear plugs on my pillow so I don't spend hours rolling mistakes and harms around inside my head...If I don't go to sleep immediately, I have to listen to a book... I don't know why they are all so negative... I've lives a fairly good life... don't break the law, Pay my taxes...It's been good, so why I'm haunted I don't know...
Vol

[LisaCarol]

As Tennyson so wonderfully stated, “It is better to have love and lost than to have never loved at all”. Cherish the memories and thank God you were able to live it. Now you share it with us so vividly and with the most creative of words.

[Vol]

LisaCarol,
I think I am a very flawed good guy... I have lost so many,,, taken by other men, lost to their fantasies, or just death.... I will love them all till I die.
Vol

[Michael Sun Bear]

Damn it hurts, don’t it!! So much we have lost…..

[Vol]

Mike
Fortunately, my constitution is resilient, and I am cursed with what I refer to as "Stupid Optimism."
Vol

[DIVYA]

Vol, no words suffice but this is just life. We're not given any power over it. This poem breaks my heart so I can imagine the magnitude of your pain. Breathe deeply, my friend and exhale. God bless you and strengthen you.

[Vol]

Divya,
You know I have this thing inside me that wants to experience all my feelings as deeply as I can, to taste them hear them, swallow them whole, and not deny their importance or effect. I have had five great loves in my life, three are dead, one is gone and one in bloom.
I don't think of us as powerless in the river of life... WE are a kind of Avatar of God, created to represent Him here on earth... a rather simple undertaking... Do good things... love your neighbor... live an aware life... I want to say there is always more JOY than sorrow, but I live comfortably in America where that is true, I am not a woman in Afghanistan, or a Morlock in the slums of some Blue city...
You're a poet, and a damn fine one, so I don't need to say it... you know it is the Poet's burden to tell the truth about life and to paint that truth with words so everyone can see...
Vol

[DIVYA]

Joy isn't related to where one lives- whether America or Afghanistan or any slum or palace for that matter. No place is a passport to joy. Its a very internal state. Also, please don't adopt a dismissive tone about women in Afghanistan. They're fighters - suppressed but not resigned. Please read about their struggles.

However. If you savour your sense of loss, if the pain makes you feel alive then thats a great thing. And I agree that as a poet you must put it into words. Keep doing that. All the best to you.

[emmajoygreen]

Finely written but so very sad.

[Vol]

EmmaJoy,
I must admit, that since I am so alone out here in the middle of nowhere, that after about forty-five years of partnering, I will never be comfortable rolling over to an empty side of the bed. I loved having shoulder length hair, now I am bald. I've no one to share my bed now, but it is a dream I will not give up on.
Vol

[emmajoygreen]

Dreams are magic and as such, are prepared to wait and wait and wait for truth to burst through an opening and shout, ' I live!' :)

[Vol]

AH! The words of John Carter! I LIVE!

[emmajoygreen]

Sometimes words just happen.. some delight, some hurt, but to know what one knows could be seen as a miracle!