All Gone
by Marge Piercy
It never heals. You go over the moment
the jaws of that night snapping shut.
When you forget you feel guilty
and when you remember, you want to forget.
I could have been there, I could have prevented,
I could have returned the phone call, come back
two weeks early, I could have guessed at the blood
thickening her voice, I could have stopped him,
put it off, found the remedy, the antidote,
the medicine, the right words that would patch the rip
in the wall of his life. Forgetting makes you guilty
and when you remember, you want to forget.
We stumble along making do, getting by, improvising.
Things dangle. Stuff piles up in corners with dustballs.
The to do list is much too long to do, so friends get put off.
Those we love will forgive us. Tomorrow, next week, in a month
we will make time to heal wounds, to patch the heart,
to fulfill the promise forgotten in the mind’s back closet.
The time is all gone. When you forget, you feel guilty
and when you remember, you want desperately to forget.
Copyright © 2002 by Marge Piercy.
