3.1415 Irrational numbers 92653 Phone numbers, ID’s 58979 French horn scale fingerings 32384 House numbers, license plates 62643 Spelling tests 38327

What’s your number? Cool, I can’t forget it I whiz through mental math But forget to do the homework I know one hundred and twenty Four or five or six Digits of 3.1415926 Did I take my meds at six? No wonder I feel sick!

Sometimes I fear my mind is going When short term takes the scenic route And brain fog fills the gaps And thoughts spill out my head like water

But those first thirty digits 3.14 to 327 Have never let me down

———————— This is my personal checkpoint. Been spending two months coming up with reasons NOT to write. Now, I just try and see what happens. Baby step goal: minimum 1 post per three weeks

Memory Is The one I wanna erase But Not all of them As some are My plays My days But Many are hard one to Gaze So can I erase? The hardest play?

Who even are you?

If the only memories you have left are stories you're fed by family, how can you even decipher what you were?

Are you really that little girl in that picture, smiling with all her crooked teeth?

A smile so genuine, you wonder how long it's been since you've smiled like that.

Of course you don't remember.

How could you?

You've removed all the old furniture from the house in your brain, leaving nothing but dust and spiders crawling around.

Where did all your memories go?

The joy?

Now you sit in your room, just another teenage boy wondering what he's doing with his life.

Wake up, go to school, work, sleep.

The same cycle repeats.

What did you do yesterday?

As the days blend together, you forget everything but the routine.

A mindless robot, no memory card inserted.

Is life even worth remembering?

Forget it.

Oh. You already did.

When shadows fall and day departs, I mourn a love that once did bloom, A fragile blossom snapped and gone, Thy vacant chair, a dusty room.

The echoes of thy laughter die, Like petals scattered on the breeze, Yet tender memories still I hold, A treasured sigh on bended knees.

With faith I'll search the hallowed ground, Where buried love yet holds its sway, And trust that there, new blooms are found, Eternal, come the break of day.

Remember When we used to make mud pies And potions out of dirt and pond water.   Or when we dug for worms Even though my dad would get mad That we dug up his grass.   And we’d go playing in the woods Looking for salamanders Or for wild berry bushes.   You remember, Don’t you?   You have to remember.

We spent so many hours Days Weeks Years together as a kid   We always played together

Together.   You were there   Weren’t you?

Shut up Your too loud Get out of my head Stop buzzing

Shut up I’m not doing this Not going back To that awful night Shut up That’s my reason I don’t want an out This time

Shut up Please I’m scared So very scared Shut up Fine I’ll do it But there are boundaries Rules For our expression

Get out of my head Get out my head Head, get out Get out Out Bleeding Out

Please stop I’m frightened Shut up Get out of my head

Before I do what I always do

A small pitter patter of rain begins. For anyone else, rain might mean dreadful times. Times filled with sorrow and pain.

Or it may mean evidence of springing hope, a rainbow on the other side, a light of green when the gloom finally leaves.

But for me,

it just means Rose.

It had been a hot day, but the grey in the sky warned of a storm.

I was kicked out of the house. Pa got home from work early, and that usually meant trouble.

As soon as I walked inside from school, my brother Tom gave me a look that immediately advised it would be better if I weren’t inside.

So I trudged out on the porch and into the woods. There wasn’t much more a kid my age could do but invest in my imagination. Tom and Reggie were so much older than me they never cared to play.

I headed farther in the woods, past our small cemetery that included a little small cross. Before Tom, Reggie, and I had been born, I had a sister who died when she was seven. Pa and Ma didn’t talk about her much.

I grabbed a branch and headed deeper into the woods, over rotten logs and rich green underbrush, trudging over muddy holes and little ditches filled with rainwater and mosquitoes.

Eventually I made it to the creek. I rested my little branch beside a rock and padded onto the soft mud, wadding in to let the refreshing water reach my waist.

When it started to get dark and got tired of swimming and making little clay cups, I got out to dry.

But then I saw her.

Bright amber eyes stared at me behind a tree, messy dark hair in a mass.

“Hello?” I asked, standing up straight to try and get a better look. The eyes stayed steady on me, not moving.

Looking back, a boy my size and age should have felt uneasy. The ghostly appearance of her yellow eyes seem to be forever burned into my memory. I didn’t know what would happen next, but I had the trusting innocence of a boy who just wanted a playmate.

“My names Red.” I said while inching closer. “What’s your name?”

The girl said nothing.

I had no idea had to coax her out. “So, do you want to play? I’ve got two branches we can play with.”

I searched for the branch I had earlier, but failed to find it. Then I looked up and realized she had come out from her hiding place and was holding the branch out to me.

She had scrawny limbs covered head to toe in patches of dirt. On her was a small white shirt that was stained with dirt. She had rolled, scruffed up jeans that seemed a size too big. She was so small, maybe a year younger than me.

I accepted my carved branch. “How did you get this?”

She said nothing.

“Do you want to play a game?” I asked finally, awaiting the answer that would make or break me.

She hesitated, then nodded.

A new excitement filled me, one that realized I might for once have a partner in my games. Someone to assist my imaginative development was a friend worth keeping.

Our friendship sparked from there. We played knights, chopping at each other with branches and racing through the woods.

I learned then that she was small but very fast. And she could climb.

She could climb nearly as well as the squirrels, thrusting her little body up with effortless movements and crawling up branches as if gravity meant nothing to

As it started to get dark, a low rumbling echoed throughout the gloomy sky.

She stopped playing and looked suddenly frightened, grabbing my hand and pulling me a direction in the woods I had never gone before.

Eventually we came to a small, rotten treehouse wrapped around a dying oak. It was missing several steps but she climbed over them as if she could do it blindfolded.

Inside the treehouse were countless trinkets. Sylverware, old toys, broken pots, pans, and random rusty pieces of metal I didn’t recognize filled the rotten space.

“Do you live here?”

She nodded.

We spent the rest of the hour in conversation. Well, I did most of the talking, but she was a great listener.

And finally I got curious enough to ask her name for the second time.

All she did then was borrow my pocket knife. Slowly she carved out four letters in the rotten wood. It was a simple word that I sounded out with ease.

“Rose.” I sounded.

She nodded.

“Like the flower?”

She nodded.

Before we could talk any more, it started to rain. Not a light trickle, but a pouring of rain that threatened to wash anyone away.

I took advantage of the weather and raced out of the treehouse, finding large puddles to splash in and flood streams to follow. I expected Rose to be beside me, but she was still curled up in the treehouse.

She was terrified of it.

So that day I introduced Rose to rain. It still leaves me clueless how one can have no fear in heights, but be terrified of rain.

And the best part of it, as I finally headed home, was that I heard Rose laughing as she splashed in her newfound love.

I sprinted home and vented to Ma about her. I told her about her climbing skills and her old fear of rain. I told her about all the new games we played.

“And what was her name?” My Ma asked, a little concerned as she chopped garlic.

“Rose.” I chimed.

Ma turned as pale as the garlic she was chopping.

Rose was my sister.

I never saw Rose or that treehouse ever again, nor do I know whether she was dead or alive.

But to this day, whenever it rains, I still hear that precious laugh.

The laugh of Rose.

Tears are streaming down my face Along with water from the rain I bet up there you feel the same One heart, two halves One’s beating, the other is maimed

My half’s barely getting by, Without your sunshine from the sky Send some please, or I might die One heart, two halves One is thumping, the other has died

Remembering the day I met you Your eyes a clear and crystal blue I didn’t know our friendship would be true One heart, two halves One is weakening, the other is skewed

We would bond over small things—books The similarities and differences of our looks But I never knew it would be your life they took One heart, two halves One is dying, the other is hooked

I can’t go living like this isn’t real I’m hoping someone wants to kill Because I’m ready to join your hell One heart, two halves And both are still.

My memory isn’t my own. Maybe it used to be but this person in my head is not me. She is happy, she is beautiful, she is pure. Pure hearted, pure minded. I no longer recognise myself nor do I recognise this personality that seems to follow me. I no longer see me. I see someone who tried and failed. I see someone who wishes things were different. I hate who I have become. I hate myself. No, I despise myself. I despise the way I think, I despise the way I look, I despise the way I treat others. I despise myself. I have twisted my memories to make myself look like a good person. I lie, I lied, I’m lying. I’m always lying. To myself and to others. My memory says I am human. I do not believe it. How can someone as horrid as me be human?

I was so small Once Once upon a time Or was I?

I don’t recall the time Just Just a feel How to describe?

I remember it Well Well enough I was full of joy

This treasured memory Happy Happiness and joy And balloons and laugher

I don’t know what it was When When was I so young? I was such a happy child that day

I know it meant the world to me This This extraordinary birthday Just because that time…

My two parents were there with me