Desert Ash

Attachment to anything
Is attachment to your own
Memory making the thing.

What else could it be? The house,
The friend, the familiar tree,
The favorite food, the spouse,

The fraught political cause,
The cherished torchlit protests,
The rapturous prayer in church,

The roar of amusement parks,
The quiet side of the road,
You love when you remember

Your memories that are you,
Down to the sensory glow
Memory makes in your bones.

You only love what’s in you,
What tunes you, remembering.
Perish the thought you forget.