A note on memory

what is a scent but a memory trapped in chemicals?

A molecular mapping from nose to brain to heart

It doesn’t always have to be in that order

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time is not linear

I think it is possibly a spiral

or perhaps

one of those old slinkies from the nineties —

Time compresses and expands

One minute you’ll be cutting a ripe fruit and

next

you’re transported to a thrift store couch

that you can’t quite remember the color of

laughter that you want to forget

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Do you remember the watermelon?

How you made us pretend that we were wolf cubs

diving into bloody deer meat?

And you, Father Wolf, urging us onward as we

feral children

dove into the pulpy red mess

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In Urdu, the word for suffering is dhukh

If you say it often enough

it starts resembling a heartbeat

beating like a metronome trapped somewhere in your ribcage

dhukh دکھ dhukh دکھ dhukh دکھ dhukh دکھ dhukh دکھ

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I am adding watermelons to the list of smells

that will transport me back to you

It wasn’t all bad right? You loved us right? sometimes?

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