Past Present

       A rose petal descends slowly, flat and red, not the color of lipstick, but deeper, as blood. The wind plays in it until a thoughtful child plucks it from shallow roots, grasping tight, squeezing it deeper than sight, feeling the mass shrink while the perfume spreads between the sweaty pinch of flesh on flesh. "Don't touch that," sharp. Feel less. One by one Mom plucks the rest and softly, gently places her time, flat, between two books, heavy and unread. There they rest, their learned grave, their word shroud. A few escaped, shriveled away beneath the vase, legless, betraying the too-close bloom above, the clear, cold glass layered in condescending condensation. The shriveled few get sucked into the vacuum. 
         The very lucky petals get found someday while the child, now grown and seldom remembered, leafs through Ba-Bu, She hopes for some direction, some subject, some b-word now equally forgotten. The petals, perfectly flat, dead and a duller color, slide to the base spine, some crushed during that hard transition out of the crevice, into less stale air. This air breathes too new and fresh for those whole ghosts, those pinky-red lush tear shapes. "This graveyard, my inheritance," too soft to penetrate ears. Feel more. She gently sweeps the long-dead crumbles into a green striped oragami box, for later, as if now didn't ring later enough. What do you do with a box, soaked in the past, steeped in regret, besides label it "fragile" and mark it "forget"? 
         Smiling to herself, she accidently flashes to one of the few kept, preserved, nurtured, and maybe unreal memories from that past. "Why here, mind?" Let it die in that empty past, press it flat or leave it plump, but bury it all the same. Time shoots or stands still; rushing in a rivulet of trickles. It speeds motionless. It sits, silently erect, until it spills into my chest and weights it closed. I will sit, breathless and small until expedient, so as not to waken. I will imagine a small whisper that balloons into a crushing.
Forgetting is easiest, easy to stop thoughts, right as they bud: To pluck them swiftly, toss them aside--no--shove them deeper than can be found. Every dull ache differs from the one before, persistently quiet, coldly separate. It hurts to be alone with half thoughts...unthoughts as well. They creep through the nerve lining your stomach into the deepest flesh in your chest. They choke you and bleed back into the gray tissues of thought. So, stop them quickly, bury the easily concealed sparks, so catching.
In this moment, she cannot douse the quicker flames and thickening wafts of rose scented smoke, now just smoke.

Mom drinks and is selfish. She drinks for no reason but want. Lust. I don't understand that pull away from me into some breathless, lifeless thing. I don't understand, I only long for her scotch flavored warmth, her smoky hug. She pushes me away, hard. I used to remember, think and think, rock back and forth in numbing motion until I could feel crisp sheets in the sun, smell something baking, fingers stiff from playing, dirty in the yard all day--a memory from some other kid's house, yard. Now, I leave and hide, take in the smell of sick, smoky carpet and tear stung eyes so my future me will remember each detail. Burning the image of a sloppy day in my mind also marks that far future, brands and scars these surroundings onto future surrounding. Today I've had enough real present and fake past, so I climb the creaky steps to the attic, pull the gateway behind me so she can't follow. If she asked, I would let her in, but she doesn't know when I'm gone, only that there is an empty space for more of her thoughts, clear air for smoke rings. I am that smoke, I waft in and around her, she yearns to draw me deep between her thoughts, blurring and smudging them hard. She looks perfect.

       Petals: Too stiff to be real. She stares at the careful box, gently lifting the lid to drink in a scent of paling yesterday. "These crisp silhouettes cannot exist here, now," unsure. Think harder. As a flash, thought lightens her mind in every fleshy corner. The loudest thought draws a warm bath, penetrates the thick surface with tentative hand, palm downward, softening the uppermost liquid into a glove. "This is warmth." She drops one precious petal, it floats for a moment. Then, capsized by the soft ripple as she enters the water, the magic keeping petal afloat disperses, , gathering as droplets on nearby mirror, fogging her cold reflection. Petal softens, not new