only accessed through recollection

"only accessed through recollection"

I watch my memory 

dissolve into time

fading away 

as a velvety mist 

of feelings and burdens

leaving behind 

barely a trace 

they were ever 

even there,

Like my icy breath

sliding out over my lips

fading

into the winter air

going from 

elegant icy lines 

to blending in to a silky haze,

   memories slowly eroding away 

   into almost nothing

   under the constant grind 

of denial and trauma and regret;

We are only 

ever so lucky 

to feel the grooves and textures

of what beautiful memories felt like 

only a few times;

   And never lucky enough 

   to get a detailed glimpse 

   of what the memory was

to begin with;

Formlessly existing somewhere 

among the blackness of thought

as we breath in time

and exhale memory

   eventually

   losing any evidence 

   that those memories

were ever even real.

-Armando Torres