04-28-2016, 01:30 PM
The city of memory and forgetting
How queer it seems, to find the houses changed,
nothing quite what it used to be. Strangers
have replaced family and friends; you can’t
find them in the faces around you. The streets
don’t lead home any more.
The corner store is there, but boarded up.
Is this the playground? You reach
for your sister’s hand, for comfort
and catch sight of your own,
the skinny wrinkled fingers of a crone.
How queer it seems, to find the houses changed,
nothing quite what it used to be. Strangers
have replaced family and friends; you can’t
find them in the faces around you. The streets
don’t lead home any more.
The corner store is there, but boarded up.
Is this the playground? You reach
for your sister’s hand, for comfort
and catch sight of your own,
the skinny wrinkled fingers of a crone.