Memento

In small, treasure boxes
Tucked in clothes drawers,
Or slyly hidden under secret, false floors.
In the over-stuffed closets,
On the mind's highest ledge,
I'm a memento…
A tarnished trinket you still hold onto…
Neatly tucked away in tissue-wrapped eternity
Beneath, behind, in back.

I'm your reminder of joy and sadness
Your souvenir of disappointment,
Personal significant scrap.
What was once your fluid ocean,
Is now emotional sap.
I am forgotten…mostly, but for
Once in a decade discovered again.
In a search for something else,
Or a dusting of the shelves.

I am the starched and folded, uncataloged dream.
Life is never as neat as we want it to seem.
I'm your life once-lived and twice-conceived
Returned from memory and thrice bereaved
To shake your senses, to tingle your skin,
Whispering soft whispers in your tiny ears again.
My heart, my voice, my verse, my song,
Here for a moment but never for long.
Embracing distraction without the splashing of limbs,
Swimming sweet secrets where the sweet secrets swim.