Poem by Lauren Kalinowski
My eyeballs twitch to blink, they dry out before I remember, staring but not seeing,
To
Blink.
Wedge something into my occipital joint
Please, anything, your thumb, a shoe, an axe,
Make it stop.
A giant’s forceps clamp my temples as
I constantly click my jaw.
Crack.
Its so tight,
Like the wobbly tightrope I’m walking.
Sometimes I’m afraid I’m falling but
you can’t fall off the floor.
This woman across the table from me,
She’s my friend,
our daughters have been classmates for five years,
I forget her
Name.
What’s her name?
I know I know her name.
I live in unit 303. My brain says 303
and my hand writes 330,
but it’s 303, right?
I know it’s not 330. My hand is wrong
but is it?
I live in unit
3 oh
Something.
Katie, that’s her name.
It’s 303, I say, as I’m driving to work the same route
I drive Monday to Friday
but I forgot to turn left
but I should know these buildings
I see them every day
why does it look like I’ve never been down this street before.
I laugh with anxiety
as I sign and date
the permission slip for my daughter to attend the nature walk field trip,
it’s 2024, right? Or is it 2023.
I’m blank again,
bile rushes my tonsils.
She laughs too,
twenty twenty four, silly mommy.
I check my cell phone just to make sure.
About the Author – Lauren Kalinowski
Lauren Kalinowski writes at the intersection of memory and motherhood. Her poetry appears in Existere, Circe, and Queens Quarterly. She co-edits Edmonton Scene, studied under Derek Walcott, and left fifteen years in construction to chase words full-time. Mother of four, she explores what ancestors whisper through bloodlines.
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