Blues for Almost Forgotten Music

By Roxane Beth Johnson

I am trying to remember the lyrics of old songs

I’ve forgotten, mostly

I am trying to remember one-hit wonders, hymns,

and musicals like West Side Story.

Singing over and over what I can recall, I hum remnants on

buses and in the car.

I am so often alone these days with echoes of these old songs

and my ghosted lovers.

I am so often alone that I can almost hear it, can almost feel

the half-touch of others,

can almost taste the licked clean spine of the melody I’ve lost.

I remember the records rubbed with static and the needle

gathering dust.

I remember the taste of a mouth so sudden and still cold from

wintry gusts.

It seemed incredible then — a favorite song, a love found.

It wasn't, after all.

Days later, while vacuuming, the lyrics come without thinking.

Days later, I think I see my old lover in a café but don’t,

how pleasing

it was to think it was him, to finally sing that song.

This is the way of all amplitude: we need the brightness

to die some.

This is the way of love and music: it plays like a god and

then is done.

Do I feel better remembering, knowing for certain

what’s gone?

Source: Jubilee (Anhinga Press, 2006)

Anti-Love Poems