Anamnesis

Nanette Cherry

praeteritum est praesens

The scars of a lifetime describe
the essence of whom we have been.

Life devolves to what is lost.

Eschew slogans; admit the inevitable.
Time does not read self-help books,
nor care about your positive thinking.

And 70 is not the new 35.

Ghostly images crowd your head,
reduced to evocative reminders:
faded shades: lovers, people,
homes, places, things you owned,
impalpable but in recollection.

Present becomes memory.
A now shot full of holes
into which what was has
fallen away for good and
what isn’t overwhelms what is.

We live in the past pretending
that we live towards the future.

Lost boats beating against the wind.