The Dead Slutch

A stripe big memory comes in

I am stricken I am stricken I am stricken

It comes in quickly, it comes in truthfully

Bites me.

Until I can't move

I am pinned by my past.

I don't know who I am.

I was sure of who I was.

I wrote about it a million times

I keep the photograph on my wall

Everyone keeps the photograph on their wall!

My photograph, on your wall

You know who I am

You know who I am

You know who I am

You know who I am

You keep me stuck to you.

You wear me

I fit perception because

I am everything that you want me, to be

I did something

I did something bad

I did something good

I don't know what I did

But the outline of the memory comes after me

No, I remember

It was beautiful

You were beautiful

I see you in everything that I see

You belonged to me

No, I belonged to you

I was everything

We were everything

It was us

But it's not me, and that's not you.

It's all dead, us, I mean

I don't know what else there is to see

I don't know where else there is to go

Whose hair are those?

Whose eyes are those?

Oh god, what things those eyes have seen since they had not!

Oh god!

What pale skin adorns me now that isn't processed in, the picture‽

Where am I?

I don't recognize any of this.

Who are you?

Who are any of you?

I walked into this room.

I opened the box on the dresser.

Under the dresser.

In the cabinet.

Under the bed.

In the center of the room.

I opened the box, and something was inside.

But it's decrepit now. It's dead now.

It doesn't belong to me or anyone else now.

I don't know whose memory this is, but it isn't mine.