Like Some Kind of Smoke in a Bottle

That scratchy cloth against your skin,
That greasy, salty reek of chips,

That side-eyed silence, half a smile,
You saw in the silk-lined casket,

That breeze lifting off wet pavement,
Lavender mixed with petrichor

And the faint stench of something else
You can’t place, residue of dung?

We could go on. Those things you sensed,
As if we’d offered them to you,

Were conjured from your memories,
Even though your brain was guessing

That shade we said was thrax-egg blue.
You know those movies in which clones

Or androids have epiphanies
That their memories aren’t their own,

That their selves, their flesh, their beings
Were never the originals?

That’s how you make meanings in mind,
Raw, new ghosts swirling, every time.