memory

Just a Memory ~ haibun

/ Ken Gierke / rivrvlogr / 13 Comments

Just a Memory

We often treasure what is hardest to obtain, or retain. So it is for me with memories. They say that every time we remember something the details of that memory are altered. If only that were the case for me. Details are the first to go, so altering them is an entirely different matter. If I have to re-enter a room to remember why I entered it to begin with, what are the chances that I will remember specific details, whether from distant or recent past?

Consider a recent conversation I had with two people. I might recall part of the conversation, but I’m just as likely to credit a statement to the wrong person.

And a specific event? I might be able to visualize it, but there is no guarantee that I will remember anything other than a snapshot. It’s always been this way for me, compounded now in my later years. At least, that’s the way I remember it.

leaf falls and is gone
tree waits for return of spring
just a memory

This is my response to Haibun Monday 5-22-23: Memory,
the prompt from Frank Tassone at dVerse ~ Poets Pub.

Somewhere in My Mind

/ Ken Gierke / rivrvlogr / 11 Comments

Somewhere in My Mind

There, then gone,
lost          somewhere.

How to address this
when there is no memory.

A hundred times a day,
I go to the well.

Each time I return
with an empty cup.

Nothing to do but go on,
moment to moment,

try to break the spell
as I greet each moment,

looking for the memories
lost somewhere in my mind.

This poem is my response to Poetics: Lost poems and Found Poetry, the prompt from Laura Bloomsberry at dVerse ~ Poets Pub, which is to write a found poem from one of those provided, with no required adherence to exact wording or order and the freedom to add to the “found” words. I have used Lost in Plain Sight, by Peter Schneider, which was sourced from Poetry Foundation. The original appears below, with used words in bold.

Lost in Plain Sight
  By Peter Schneider

Somewhere recently
I lost my short-term memory.
It was there and then it moved
like the flash of a red fox
along a line fence.

My short-term memory
has no address but here
no time but now.
It is a straight-man, waiting to speak
to fill in empty space
with name, date, trivia, punch line.
And then it fails to show.

It is lost, hiding somewhere out back
a dried ragweed stalk on the Kansas Prairie
holding the shadow of its life
against a January wind.

How am I to go on?
I wake up a hundred times a day.
Who am I waiting for
what am I looking for
why do I have this empty cup
on the porch or in the yard?
I greet my neighbor, who smiles.
I turn a slow, lazy Susan
in my mind, looking for
some clue, anything to break the spell
of being lost in plain sight.

Long Past Spring

/ Ken Gierke / rivrvlogr / 41 Comments

It is very hard to write this way, beginning things backward…
                                                  Ernest Hemingway, The Torrents of Spring (1926)

The Torrents of Spring_coverLong Past Spring

Each passing year,
I think more of my youth.
But what words to write,
when memory grows dim
and tales that come to mind
could be mine or belong
to another? Would the world
know the difference? Would I?

 

This poem is my response to dVerse Poetics – One True Sentence, the prompt from Lisa at dVerse ~ Poets Pub, which is to use one of the sentences provided, quotes from the works of Ernest Hemingway to write a poem.
Hemingway’s novella, The Torrents of Spring, is one that I have not read. Ironically, after writing this I read the Wikipedia article about the novella to learn that there is a character who, regarding the protagonist, “enthralls him with her store of literary (but possibly made up) anecdotes.”

Image source: Wikipedia.org

rudderless

/ Ken Gierke / rivrvlogr / 22 Comments

rudderless

far from flawless,
my memories, homeless
in their wanderings

searching for details
in times no longer ageless,
leaving me helpless

formless, these thoughts
passing through my mind,
almost wordless

Choosing words from the supplied list (below), this series of senryū is my response to
Tuesday Poetics: Less is More, more or less, from Laura at dVerse ~ Poets Pub.

ageless ~ boundless ~ breathless ~ careless ~ cloudless ~ colourless ~ faceless ~ fearless ~ feckless ~ flawless ~ formless ~ harmless ~ heedless ~ helpless ~ homeless ~ listless ~ needless ~ restless ~ rootless ~ senseless ~ tasteless ~ weightless ~ windowless ~ wordless ~

I’m also linking this to Colleen’s 2019 Weekly #Tanka Tuesday
#Poetry Challenge No. 156, #Poet’sChoice.

Fleeting Memories ~ ekphrastic poem

/ Ken Gierke / rivrvlogr / 12 Comments

Fleeting Memories

Tiny currents brush the edges of my mind.
Random details, trivial and not-so-
minor, flutter, teasing my thoughts.
Never clear in their intent. Prodding me
to remember, or struggling
to break the tethers imposed
by those details, always out of reach?

This is my response to Reena’s Exploration Challenge #113,
which offers a variety of images for inspiration.

Image source: pexels.com / Anthony

Uncertainty ~ magnetic poetry

/ Ken Gierke / rivrvlogr / 15 Comments

uncertainty

Uncertainty

What is a memory
that cannot be held?

Is there meaning
in absence

as my days grow shorter
and my thoughts slip away?

uncertainty_2.png


My memory has always been a wreck. I can hear a story and recognize most of the details, but I can’t always remember those details until I hear them. In the past few years, my short-term memory has been getting worse. Of course, I worry about what that means as I get older.

It was a few years back that I got a handle on ADD. Knew it was there. Pretended it wasn’t. Finally admitted it was, as it got worse. Routine is my primary way of compensating for it, but every once in a while I get one of these “spells” – walking in and out of a room so I can figure out why I’m there; skipping a small step in a process like a recipe; switching from a document to a browser to look something up, then going back to the document to (maybe) figure out what it was I needed. That last one has happened a handful of times in the last week. At times, I might as well be looking at a blank screen. It’s been on my mind, so I’m working on a poem to address it. I took a break to try some magnetic poetry. I guess it was still on my mind.

Ken G.


If you want to try magnetic poetry, you can do it online, here.

Image source: pixabay.com

 

Back when I knew what I don’t know now

/ Ken Gierke / rivrvlogr / 7 Comments

Back when I knew what I don't know now.png

Back when I knew what I don’t know now

A four barrel carb could practically rebuild itself,
instructions followed, and such.

Drop a tranny and replace it, all in one morning,
because the pocketbook demands it.

Doing something once doesn’t mean
I know how to do it. But I did it.

Just like sliding headfirst down the road beside my motorcycle
didn’t foster a desire to try doing it again.

Then there’s breaking a leg. Wouldn’t want to do that again,
but the next time probably would be easier.

What was that poem I wrote yesterday?
Lines blur between here and there, then and now.

Are the brain cells holding those lessons, those memories,
dead and gone, or are they just waiting to haunt me in dementia?

 

Image source: hotrod.com

Snow Globe Memory – #writephoto

/ Ken Gierke / rivrvlogr / 15 Comments

snow-globe-memory

Snow Globe Memory

Snow globe scene of a distant past
With brilliant lights that seem to cast
A pleasant air of joy on a time long gone

Looking back on what might have been
Not even remorse could begin
To erase the sadness of a time long gone

The snowflakes fall within my mind
And I find myself now resigned
To the fate delivered in a time long gone

This is my response to Sue Vincent’s  (Daily Echo) Thursday Photo Prompt – Lights #writephoto, with her photo. This rhyme scheme may have a name. Maybe not.