To Forget

An interesting episode while driving...

To Forget

It always starts when I'm driving
The feel I've forgotten something incredibly important
I start with the obvious things - wallet, cell phone, keys,
I pat my pockets but the keys aren't there-
I panic, turn on a light, and rummage-
Then I realize - I'm driving, and the keys are in the ignition.

If it's not those things, then what have I forgotten?
I think back - try to remember- then it hits me.
I can't remember us together anymore-
Like a dream you try to save when you wake up-
Killing it in the process, losing more as you try to hold it in your head.
Like a camera with an unfocused lens, I try to keep the images together.

I've lost the embarrassed smile you'd get when I'd brush* your arm-
Or the ways we'd stare each other down with a smile-
The lines are blurring, the colors running together-
Like a still frame in warm water-
Warped, twisted, unrealistic, and unbelievable.

Why should I believe them?
They're just dreams - that's why it's so hard to remember-
It's easy to forget what never happened.

Author's Note

I wrote this one... last Saturday, actually - and the first stanza is completely true... I was driving and thought I lost my keys. Yeah... :)

I didn't have a title for it... and then... I wrote "To Remember" a couple of days ago... I like the irony of having them kind of go together... :D

There's an image in the poem of a still frame in water... but... a still frame is like a picture. I couldn't for the life of me remember what I was trying to convey when I wrote it - but I couldn't think of any words that flowed as well...

...the image I was trying to get across was something like one of those "watercolor" pages out of a coloring book... thrown into a lake... I chose to call it something else, but that's what I meant... mostly... I think... :D