My Number

I have forgotten my PIN number, forgotten

which anecdotes I have told to whom

and, come to think of it, most of my best stories.

I have no longer read any of the books that lean

against each other now with their dog-ears

and grease stains.  I may have taken my various

once-daily doses several times or not at all. 

The bathtub has long since drained and still

I sit here, blinking, naked as the day I was born.

I remember the way to the trailhead

of the mountain I always said I would climb

when it came to this.  I told myself I would sit

on the peak and face into the sun until it was gone.

In the last light my mind would hold as tightly

as it could to Peter-boy . . . and Jamesie and . . .

the rest, urging them to live wildly happy lives

and not wait as long as I have to stop being afraid—

things I may have told them once or a hundred times before.

(from Oberon, 2013)