CHOCOLATE EXPLANATIONS

“Right. . .!”
I try to explain it
with chocolates

that she
( girlishly )
keeps trying to eat

I pick a luscious
dark chocolate seahorse
and I say “Now this is. . .”

( and she finishes
my sentence for me )
“. . .your hippocampus!”

she squeals. . .
delighted
iwth herself

“That’s correct!”
I praise her
“. . .it’s shaped like this seahorse!”

“And it controls
your memories of you
your “who you are”

your “how your self assembles
its sense of self with all
its past and future mysteries!”

“Yes. . .yes. . .that’s it!
she claps her hands
thrilled to bits

by the familiar
telling
the reassurance of sounds

"And this twisted twirl of almond
with a real almond in the centre of it
“. . . is your amygdala!”

she blurts out before me
“You got it”
I smile

“Everyone’s got one!
a seahorse & an almond
one on each side of our brain.”

“Now the almond tells you how
to respond to the things
that you’ve assembled

into a sense of self
. . .with the proper emotion
. . .the right feeling.

. . .whether you
just like
or love it.”

“Oh, I love it. . .I love it!”
she almost sings
“Now, explain it to me again!”

I give her
the finished explanations
and she eats with exaggerated

mmmmming & ohhhhhing
“I love your explanations
about what’s wrong with my thingy”

she knocks upon her head
like it was a door
to a self that she had

locked
herself
outside of

most times
she doesn’t even know
her name

or who
or what
she is

but she loves this story of
HIPPOCAMPUS AND
ITS FAITHFUL AMYGDALA

she loves
each sound
each word

each letter each pause
of the chocolate
explanation