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If Memory Is a Lie Then So Am I

Proust searched his brain for memories that made the man, could finally understand that this changed him just by looking; so he called himself a sentimental realist! many a prisoner, in walls cast of shadows, have escaped their fate etched in stone and bars at Guantanamo, where they remade themselves in the language of pain - the poetry of misery or bliss to relive a life that past has missed, to rekindle themselves in the alembic of desire, their inner fire because of the lie of memory; I am frisson! oh, yearning moment, oh, swelling into dreams come of these needful things, where open skies and open roads and open fields are little sparks in open places closed inside of me. when this lightning sings my body moves with the ghostly touch of numinous grass and forgotten fragile flowers, the distant buzz of bee and echoing twitter of birds sound again inside of me. inside of memory is me, thereto is the lie where holes are filled by imagination, a story I call myself where fiction and reality are hopelessly intertwined, undermining who I thought was me and too, mine. this albatross of original stimulus, this verisimilitude of the incongruous, mutable impressions which fleeting fly dead-away fall into the deep error of my earnest loom; memory! the act of remembering changes me, so a fool I have become, locked in shadows, staring dumb, I shun this outer lock, sing my songs as they come from now on, making me in my own image unbecoming, unfettered, unfinished, undone ...

Copyright © | Year Posted 2009




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Date: 9/27/2009 1:35:00 PM
Much for the reader to ponder in this poem. Congratulations on making it through the first round in the contest. Good luck in the finals! Karen
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Date: 9/24/2009 3:23:00 PM
Congratulations on your poem making it through the first round.Wishing you the best in the finals Jerry. Love, Carol
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Date: 6/25/2009 11:17:00 AM
Congrats Jerry on your poem being featured this week on Poetry Soup. Vince
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Date: 6/25/2009 11:15:00 AM
Congratulations on your featured poem this week. May you have many more Jerry. Love, Carol
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Date: 6/23/2009 1:32:00 PM
Congratulations on your poetry being featured. Ernilando
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Date: 6/22/2009 7:51:00 AM
Jerry - I just wanted to stop by and congratulate you on having your poem featured this week – many blessings to you and those who share your heart – God Bless, MJ
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Book: Shattered Sighs