Unreconstructed

Unreconstructed
        is how memory
                should stay,
or so says memory
        itself. Did
                you know that
when we remember
        something
                we actually relive
it, and it’s never
        the same way
                twice?
So I can’t remember
        last Easter,
                or the days spent
in the house
        as a toddler
                with my mother,
because I wasn’t
        even there
                until she said it.
But then the flood
        comes back,
                as if I didn’t
even miss it
        until it happened,
                but I was there
in that room,
        eating the same
                lettuce on the plate
as I saw before me
        when I heard
                a memory
I couldn’t have
        been there
                to remember.
But now
        it’s with me
                where it will stay.