Can't Remember

by Evalyn Lee

In the kingdom
Of little words
I can’t remember,
Bright willows
Whisker and weep
Leaves,
Into a spring tide.

The flooding river,
Bridged by a railroad,
Redeems the space
Of my lost working
Memory. For me, words
No longer sit still
Unless written down.

So under a blue plate sky,
I take notes,
A hierarchy of marks,
As dogs snuffle
By muddy boots
And the enormous
Smallness of my memory.

A jumbo jet rages in descent
Above the boathouse,
By the turning point
Of the path I can’t remember.
I’m not like the clouds
With gray bellies, on the horizon,
I can’t hold on to rain.

I write: Clouds. Rain.
My daughter, walking with me
And revising for exams,

Holds out a poem
By Robert Frost:
You should know this, she says,
‘Leaf subsides to leaf.’
I tell her, I don’t remember,

Then I distract her,
Pointing out the talk
Of total strangers:
If he is making
A mistake, it is his
To make. Did you bring
Them? My mum did,
For us to eat,

And using my phone and thumb
I take a picture,
At Corney Reach,
To focus, seize, crucify,
This whorl of wordless now,
Water. Daughter.
Please. I must, I can, remember.