I remember you

as if Alzheimer’s were slipping backward for a second.

The brain,

a reel gone woolly

images blurting away

voices hushed.

Random shots

drifting into soap in water.

A face once heard

known yet strange.

My memories are fading

like colors on sheets

that once held their hue

until they were folded

into drawers of forgetfulness.

Yellowed edges curl

like tired and gnarled fingers.

Stories half-heard

behind rusted cupboard doors

sliding away

like a crisp leaf

from trees

denounced by spring

no longer kissed by dew.

One bid for a submission.

Another was letting go.

The earth is there

as if it were ever expected

rustling like that rusty fridge

of Hindon Quarters.

Lullabies hummed

one after another

into the suffocated nights of May

become, today,

the buried remains of summer corpses

bleeped from the flashes

of childhood light.

That which had warmth

becomes traces in the air

an afterimage

burnt into the softness of my mind

grains of a past I can't help but sift

too coarse to forget too fine to fasten.

I recall you

an unfinished prayer

left behind

in the middle of a sentence

on trembling lips

whispers of Amen melting in silence.

A farewell

too tender

for apocalypse.