AFTERIMAGE
Memory is at best a shattered glass,
the shards strewn across the floor, and
I have not the time nor patience to
fit and glue all the pieces together.
I know it's there, the memory I seek, and
eventually it rears its head like an index card in
the catalog of an ancient library
that holds no books.
I see faces but no names, strangers, and
I tick, tick, tick through the alphabet,
hoping to trigger and cement
a neural connection that sometimes comes.
I used to worry that the lapses
might lead to the end of me, but
whatever the state of my mind,
my imagination will create, through my pen,
all I need to know and believe.
What is truly real anyway?
I close my eyes, calm my restless heart, and
the image, recalled, comes into focus:
I see hair the color of the dark chocolate paste
under the outer shell of a walnut, and
feel ghostly tingling in my fingers as
fine threads of silk pass through them.
A mask of porcelain,
tinted by a sun
south of the border,
near flawless.
Eyebrows that come
together as one when
left to their own devices
of natural progression.
A mouth so perfect
it need not speak
to tell me everything
that is in the heart.
And eyes that lead me
to a place of comfort,
pigmented with hues of the
mountainsides of Montana,
reflecting the meaningful
along with the meaning,
flashing a sparkle, a glint of
light from the big bang,
reminding me of everyone
I have ever loved, and
that image will remain
with me forever.