poem a day #7

FORGETFULNESS

In the moment the phrase
--at least I think
it was a phrase-- seemed
so perfect, so memorable,
that it could never be forgotten,
not even for an instant.

But now, trying to remember
something about the way
leaves part around my footfall
or maybe it was the sun on her
kitchen tiles all those years ago or
the feeling that the world literally rushing by
has had at least one person on it
to plant the telephone pole, is
impossible.

Something that rhymes with
Maryland. Something that
sounds like people down the block
hammering. Or
something without a rhyme,
something
that has never cast a shadow,
never had someone call it by name,
never wanted, so sorely,
to be somewhere else.

I would fill a book with those words
if they would reveal themselves,
crawl from their hiding place
on the tip of my tongue.