That Won’t Happen

Well, as long as you’re still making
Memories a little faster
Than you’re losing them, it’s okay.

What’s the big deal, anyway?
You pick at your memories
Like scabs, or you collect them

Like tchotchkes filling your shelves,
Or you raid them like junk drawers
Rummaging for what you need.

A few of you are artists
Of scrap—you know who you are.
Somewhere down a rural road

Or on a scruffy corner
Where highway intersects town,
You’ve got one of those yards full

Of your leftover sculptures
Raised in the predictable
Suggestions of dinosaurs

Composed of mufflers and gears,
Or humanoid aliens,
Not quite robots or men,

Waving at the passers by,
Or, if you’re a real artist,
Maybe abstract collages

That ring in the wind, glitter
In the light, all those thought dreams
Of rearranging what was.