amnesia

In forgetting, what remains of passion?
What's forgotten? The lies I told myself or
truth's I failed by being too weak or too
strong in wrong ways. A finely honed loss
of autobiography. Something closes down;
redirects itself into emptiness and

I can't ...
(though I'm told this isn't true)
I'm searching for it like a rolled away
lost item. A misplaced ticket meant to take me
and one other passenger ...
somewhere ...
an important destination.
Everyone's waiting. I can't

remember who or where. It is written
in block letters on the tickets.
Before I've begun, I'm tired of looking.
I don't but

I can close my eyes and set my eyes
across a moving window -- a companion
beside me. Both of us gazing through
loops of surreal and remarkable remakes
of symmetry. The earth has been thoughtful
yet imbued with whimsy. She's set a hundred flowers
to buffer every footfall (if we walked there,
we'd step lightly) and high hills bent over
-- slow creatures, stone heavy,
mime's moving through time at a far
different cadence than
our window, my companion and mine, gliding
past-future. Everything slows down
when speed's so fast.

I travel behind my eyes like that.
Travelling.
Among strangers.
I forget that
I can't.
If not confidence, something's been built
through my solitude. Shadows move
across the walls. They watch me
watching. Apart from,
yet a part of their journey.
I'm their montage landscape: bereft orchard and
lush desert and so many lovely shades
of grey.

Random beauty offset by harsh absence.
Partialized,
halved,
and half forgotten ...
An indiscrete mystery.
Every third page missing.
Still, the mystery's complete.