I made a promise to myself last night that I would desist from writing poetry unless specifically for Chel’s terrible writing contest.

But The Bag Lady pointed me in the direction of The tuesday writing prompt which only allows 10 – 15 minutes on something beginning with the words …. detached memory. WTF??? Any sentence starting with the words ‘detached memory’ is destined to sound like a quotation from a psychoanalyst’s handbook. But with poetry you can say just about anything and hope that somebody else ascribes meaning to it.

So I weakened.

And I have been going on about memories lately. If not detached, then certainly distant.

But it’s not really poetry either. I’d like to stress that.

*

Detached memory

A fading love

A drifting cloud above

You reach but cannot touch

With each passing moment

Losing so much

Of what was when

Now and again

A teasing hint

A footprint

In the snow

Barely seen

Can only show

Where you have been

Not where you are

A meteor

A distant star

Yours no more

This tune will fade

Will be remade

And then replayed

Rematched

Reattached

Only to restart

In another heart.

*

And now …. we come to the romantic part of the evening …

another little stroll down through nostalgia valley.

*

Did I run my fingers through your hair
See my reflection in your eye
When you wrapped your arms around me
Did you know that we could fly
Did I feel your heartbeat in my hand
Touch your thoughts within the night
Did we steal a moment in the dark
Ever fearful of the light

There upon the mountain
With your breath upon my skin
Did you leave a gentle message
Did I hold it safe within
Beneath a smiling universe
For all the world to see
Together in our innocence
For just a moment. You and me.

*

I’ve been digging further into the vault. Suicide features quite strongly in the discarded ideas section. That and my obsession with the utter pointlessness of everything.

As I mentioned a few days ago The NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Competition kicks off again this weekend and it occurs to me, after uncovering this cheerful little piece, that I might have the basic framework for a story as long as the prompts are Romantic Comedy/Suicide/Sexual Poverty. As far as I know they have never used that exact combination of prompts before. So here’s hoping.

“I’ve been thinking about suicide,” I said to her.
She looked briefly up from her phone and brushed a few crumbs of toast off the edge of the table. A waitress walked by and I noticed a run in her stockings. A bus pulled up outside and I heard the sound of air gushing into a vacuum as it’s doors opened.
“Did you hear what I just said?”
“No. What did you just say?”
“I said that I’d been thinking about suicide.”
“Oh. Yeah. Actually, I did hear that.”
“Well?”
She looked up at me now with a smile that said – I hope this isn’t going to take too long, “Are you asking me to talk you down from the ledge?”
“Maybe.”
She looked at her phone again. A new message had arrived. “Can it wait?” she asked me, “I need to respond to Katie. She’s worried about her cat.”

The café had floor to ceiling windows and I saw a couple walking past outside. They were both wearing identical orange tee shirts. I think they were a part of some sort of protest group. They looked ridiculous.
Alison was typing away on her phone, but I continued anyway. “My main concern is fucking it up. Not taking enough pills or not picking a tall enough cliff to jump off, and ending up as some sort of pathetic living vegetable. And then, even if I get it right, there’s the issue of not being around to gauge the level of other people’s subsequent grief.”
She put her phone down to await further reports on the cat. “Which word troubles you most?” she asked, “pathetic or vegetable?”
“Both.”
“Then you’re halfway there already.”

The orange tee shirts seemed to be multiplying outside. Apparently it had something to do with a famine, somewhere.
“Will you sleep with me?” I asked.
“What? Here?”
“No. Of course not. My place. No, hang on. Your place. My place is a mess.”
“Will it prevent you from killing yourself?”
“Temporarily, at least.”
People outside were beginning to form a long orange line and were holding up banners and chanting something inaudible. Alison checked her phone again before raising her head and staring at me with a look of mock sincerity. “Listen,” she said, “I hate to sound old fashioned, but I really would like some sort of commitment about this. One way or the other.”

One of the banners outside read ‘I Was Told There Would Be Cake’, another said ‘Make Lunch not War’. It didn’t strike me as a very well thought out campaign.
“Have you tried anybody else?” Alison asked me.
“Don’t flatter yourself. Of course I have.”

It was a Saturday afternoon at the beginning of winter. Nothing much was happening. It would probably rain within the next hour or two. The prospect of being dead really did seem reasonably attractive.

“Another coffee?”

“Whatever.”

*

I’ve been rummaging through old stuff and aborted plans and discovering that most things find their way into the junk pile for a reason. I am headed there soon enough myself, of course, so I may as well get used to the decor.

Increasingly I find that, all too often, my thoughts get overtaken by nostalgic melancholy or unconvincing optimism.

This looks like some sort of love letter I might have written in my teens to somebody more beautiful than myself (so it could have been to just about anybody) trying to convey a feeling of symbiosis. back then I was willing to try almost anything.

But Im sure it doesn’t go back that far.

*

I am rough
She is my smooth
When I am flat
She is my groove
From the valley
She’s my hill
i am weak
She is my will
If I’m black
She is my white
She is my day
She is my night
I hold her hand
She holds my heart
God let us never
Be apart.

*

P.S. Always be suspicious when an atheist mentions God. There must be an ulterior motive.