This is a poem based on Joe Brainard's compilation "I remember". We read an excerpt from it in a class of mine recently and I was inspired to try out the format.
I remember swiss army knives and the diagonal cuts I would get on my thumb because I would Touch the saw too much
I remember how the in-floor heating felt in January and how snow suits smell when they get
Wet
I remember jungle gyms and swinging limbs
On the monkey bars
I remember colored pencils
And perfect letters traced from stencils
I remember a black puppy
Who always wanted to be on the couch
And a rope swing in the backyard.
I remember how the door sounds when I slam it
And I remember being told not to eat the cherry pit
Or a tree might grow inside my stomach
I remember the smell of onions cooking
And how people used to be nicer
When they didn’t know who you really were
I remember how I was always sick on Halloween
And how nobody really ever tells you
That everything is going to be okay
Until it isn't
I remember Legos and a grey carpet
And I remember the afternoon when I wished
That I could melt into the walls and
I remember a few seconds after that
When I realized that I couldn't
I remember “the ground is lava” and
Swinging in sync with the person next to you
I remember thinking about five years from now
Five years ago
And how that seemed far away
And it still does.
I remember hair in tight braids down my back
And all the things that I could keep in the many pockets
Of my cargo pants.
I remember songs that I used to skip
I would play now
If they ever came on
I remember when I didn't know how the radio worked
And when words on a page just looked like letters
Some times there is no going back
Because the only thing that will revisit the past
Is your future
Never will I be 6 again
Only my daughter and son
Will fit in my favorite Winnie the Pooh sweatshirt
I remember how that sweatshirt fit
And what it felt like on my back when it would get too warm
When I would sit too close to the fire
I remember that people don’t think they are beautiful
Until someone else tells them that it’s so
I remember starry nights and walks in the forest with the dog
And learning how you can grow mushrooms at the bottom of the hill on a log
I remember Inaugurations and homemade pizza
And I remember tears about something that none of us
Ever want to be close enough to witness
I remember that change is hard
And the discomfort during states of transition is disregarded more than it should be
And that sometimes it’s not the world that’s changed
But me
But that’s
Even harder because
I don’t remember
Where I put my time turner
After I loaned it to Hermione that one time
A while ago.
