My aim is to
collect every thing
for this
scrapbook. To cram
remnants of
my movements
between its
paper cover
and
cardboard back. To feed it
the litter
of my days
as if it
were some hungry,
shelf-dwelling
animal, eager
to masticate
my present
and digest
it as a past.
To
anthologise the trivialities –
the tickets,
the receipts, the reminders –
to plant
them and wait for
their
journeys, their purchases, their events
to grow into
a leafy, memorial splendour.
To stand
volumes, great libraries
of my fallen
leaves and listen
to the
silent regiment.
To one day
feel the thrill,
its horror
and elation in my blood’s tide
as I let go
of one of those leaves,
putting a
gaping uncertainty
between the
pages.
