She stared at the white sheet of paper in front of her. At her wrinkled brown hands that held the pen. Years ago the skin on those hands was taut and supple, a fresh golden brown skin. She sighed and stared at the paper again.

To write or not to write, that was the question.

Her pulse raced as it hadn't done in all those years. She remembered herself as a school child, panicking because she wasn't able to remember the crops grown in Guatemala fast enough to conclude an answer in her geography exam. She'd cried then, when time ran out and her answer remained unfinished. And now, years later, the same panic was gripping her again. Just that now she wasn't sure what exam she was taking. Or how much time she had left.

The fear had started that morning. When she'd been unable to remember the expression on his face. She still remembered the words he'd said, the people they'd met, what the weather that day had been like. It was the features of his face that she was unable to recall. For the first time ever.

All through her long life she'd scoffed at those who took pictures. Or kept diaries. Memories, she'd insisted, were best preserved in the mind. At full resolution. The past and the dead, years after they were gone, lived on in her mind. Unphotographed, undocumented, in vivid rich original detail. She could close her eyes and summon any memory she chose to, and relive any moment that had passed. For the past lived on, incessantly at her service.

She had no collectibles, no mementos. No picture of him. And now she couldn't remember his face.

She stared at the blank paper. And labored over the choice she had to make. She could either write, and preserve that approximation of the original. The approximation, that with time, would replace the original. Or she could let the original memories live on, and gently depart when they had to.

To cling on or to let go, that was the question.

She'd been standing there for half an hour.
Or maybe an hour.
Or possibly more.

Feet bare and shoeless,
Wedged between the cold metal bars,
Feet inured and indifferent.
Feet that understood not
Their clinging curled toes.

Her chin barely managed to tuck itself over the railing,
The railing that supported her and the weight she bore.
Her eyes, unbidden,
lent more water to the waters below.
Sporadically and occasionally they regained their sight,
Only to stare uncomprehendingly
At the torrents straight below.

They excited that numbed mind,
Those foaming waters.
They streamed below the bridge,
Away from her sight.
And unrealizingly,
Higher did she climb on the railing,
Lower did she hold her head,
All so that those currents,
Didn't betray her line of sight.


I'd been standing there for a year,
Or maybe two.
Or possibly more.

And all it took to make me let go,
Was a stroke of luck,
That raised my head,
And made me look ahead.

A raised chin. That
was all it took.