-


Sometimes it feels most practical to be able to forget
To wipe away bitter regrets and past mistakes,
Take with you those once cherished,
lightly tainted memories
and completely clean off your slate.
Wouldn't that be easy?

I'd say to myself, let's start from Square One.
Back again, to when we were fresh friends
And nothing truly mattered, because
We'd only just met
Fresh friends, see that's the safest bet
I’d barely know you and you’d barely know me.

Which means there'd be no cute stories
of how we'd often, somehow,
End up in contemporary art galleries or
browse through used paperback books in
secondhand nooks

No memories of losing myself
time and time again,
in a library of stolen glances,
paper chances
That you could possibly see me one day through my
rose colored glasses (lenses?)

I'd erase these photographs of
Your piano hands, your cautious smiles
how I'd lost my breath when you held my hand and you’d smiled
that day when we lost footing in that throng of music goers in July
intertwined, lungs vibrating,
swallowing in confetti air
Forgetting
How being that close to you was confetti in my very mind

Let there be no recollection
of dreams of stolen kisses and petty wishes
to November’s drunk hamlet readings and karaoke dances
Always one step ahead, see
You were always so much, too much
yet I could never have been quite enough

Square one,
I say
to the day I never realized just how much my veins eagerly rushed
With the synchronous sound of your name,
to when my mirror didn’t whisper every morning,
Ever since that day in May;
“I wonder if she would like this?”
Square One
Where I'd know only of you, but
not how well you drew
Square One
Where I depended on myself
and not you
Square One
Because clearly that would make things
Easy
Square One
But I don’t know if I should do
What’s right or what’s easy

So,
Maybe I shouldn’t take back
All that I said, instead
Ruminate the worthwhile pieces of what’s left
Of these lessons and these laughs
Because

2, 3, 7 months can quickly pass
And we’d still have these left over pieces
Maybe it's okay to collect them, carefully
but only with a fresh pair of eyes and
only once my mind has truly
stabilized

Maybe then I could replace
What’s left of bitter apathy
and undo it with my outstretched arms,
Open palms,
once more- maybe

I could try again with
one last
apology so
I hope you can truly see that

I’m sorry.



pk