Oh How Forgetful by Jason Ball (17, North Carolina)

​I forget the last time
I set foot in a park
I forget my old friends
Their laughs and smiles and mannerisms
I forget what my grandfather looked like
He exists solely in sepia tone portraits

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Painstakingly
Instantaneously printed on papers
Crammed into books and folders
I forget to even put
The bookmark on the page
Leaving the continuation of the story
To a veritable dice roll by fate
I forget when I stopped writing and painting
When worlds stopped existing
In the back of my mind
Only to bleed onto paper through a ballpoint vein
I forget what I want
to be in life
I usually forget my own birthday
Three years running
I often forget I’m perceived by others
I forget my own friends are there
And some days, oh some days
I forget my own name
Only for a split second or two
Or three or more
And I’ll have a small existential crisis
In the self-checkout of a grocery store
Surrounded by equally indifferent and forgetful
People with cloth hidden sneers and smiles
and frowns
And tired sad eyes
Around the block
From nowhere in particular
I sometimes forget who I am
Driving in a car before the sun rises
To nowhere in particular
Running from monsters
That are no longer under the bed
But strapped into the passenger seat
I forget that I am going to have to be someone
That I’ll have to be an interdependent
Set of functions and beliefs and aspirations
I forget to tell my friends I love them
I forget to allow even myself
The truth because my god is that scary
And that forgetfulness holds me together
Like a paper mache boat
In the middle of a stormy sea
with waves growing
Higher and higher
Rising and falling
Waning and rushing
Crashing and crashing,
Crashing, always crashing
But
I want to forget so much more
Because to forget something
You must know it first