Forgotten

There was thick
mud that day
as I slid, and slipped
my way, along the steep ravine to you;
as I did the things
that were asked of me,
that, right then, I did not want to do.
    

I looked upon the bottom
of a tree, roots entangled; an evergreen; a place that had always been to me,
a spot called clear to mind;
the place your dust rested,
in the shape of a cross,
in a year gone far behind.
    

I laid the roses
I didn’t want
to lay; and I said words I had not
prepared to say,
and I kissed my fingers in a dutiful way, and
pressed them
to the freezing ground. And then I turned around,
and climbed the sticky hill, shaking legs and an iron
will, not a tear nor a trace
would show.
     

And I walked away, triumphant; ready to go,
when a voice called out: ‘Not there…no.’
And it went on: ‘That’s not the place.
No, the ashes were never
spread that way. That wasn’t what they had to say…
you recall it all so 
wrong.’ And I tried to remember; even just which
song, was played the first
and last – and all I could hear
was the shattering of glass, as I realised each effort
drew a blank,
from the darkest corner of my mind.
    

I had no memories of any kind; it seemed all I’d known
were self-told lies, and today I cannot even find, the truth
about the colour
of the box
we laid you in.
But I think I remember
what you were wearing.
And I see lilies
and roses
when I close my eyes;
on the nights when I am lucky enough,
not to see
the moments
before you died. I remember those
the best.
    

I’m sorry…
I didn’t mean to.
I seem to have forgotten the rest.