memory

I visit this place daily. I drive through the abandoned town, down the streets where I am sure I once walked. I imagine the laughing that I once took part in, I imagine that I once wept on the shoulders of those who's faces I cannot recall and who's names ring bells but do not connect. I drive to the same place, everyday in the town which has not been touched in years, or weeks, or days or moments. In the old abandoned, once bustling library, in the cold, dusty basement, in the room behind the staircase, alone along a wall is the card catalog that I thumb through everyday. Sure to find the books that tell my life, the stories, memories and people I long to remember. I furiously go through every alphebetical grouping what I know I once felt; awe, bitter, calm, danger, excite, fear, goodbyes, humbling, intimidated, jealous, kept, lonely....I search behind the cards eager to find just one title, one book, one page of what I so desperately long to recall but behind each card are a hundred blank cards, visible is only a remnant of a word, a brush of a hand, a scent of memory. I find myself in front of the empty rows after rows of shelves holding books I know are there and cannot see. Books that hold my life, my memories, my pain.... they are not to be found. The wind blows strong and then scent I remember but cannot recall is absorbed by my every cell and I quicken my search to remember all I have forgotten. Last week, last month, the most precious moments, unforgettable faces, unforgettable laughter, unforgettable powerful emotions happen and dissappear in my mind quicker than I can recall and I cannot hang on nor can I retrieve anything that makes me who I am. I do not remember why you make me sad or why I love that place or why I cry at that song. I cannot remember what I loved or did or mastered or failed. I just remember white. I remember space. I remember nothing. And as I drive out of town down the same road I travel daily in my journey for peace for one second I get a glimps of what I have forgotten and as surely as it appears it passes and I will come back to this spot, this dark and unappealing place until I find my peace, until I read my stories, until I memorize my mind.