What It's Like To Be Lost

With this poem, I’ve joined TFE’s Poetry Bus world tour. Argent is running the ticket office this week, and posting the blog addresses of some talented tour members. Our assigned task is to write about either 1) a daffy relative, or 2) what it feels like to be lost. My poem is a little of both.

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Sometimes, when you’re under great stress, you black out all incoming information except that which is imperative to your survival.
Then later, when you try to recall the stressful event, you find large gaps in your memory, where your brain simply deleted stuff that it believed was unnecessary.
I was lost in that blackout zone for a few weeks early this month. My mother went super daffy and I somehow went with her.
Here, in a series of haiku (stanzas with a particular rhythm), is a description of how that state feels.

Blackout


Fear dims memory
You have been here before this
Don’t you remember?

Put up the “closed” sign
Shut the windows. Pull the blinds
Step out. Lock the door.

Assume a blank face
Take the elevator down
Walk into the street

Sleepwalker shuffling
Bare feet wade through broken glass
Crouch Howl like a dog

Train tracks hum a tune
Freight train rockets through the night
Rattle clatter bang!

Duck your head and run
For the dark house down the road
Slam and lock the door

Darkness is total
The silence reverberates
Outside, a cat screams.

Curl up in the bed.
A blanket over your head.
Shiver. Block all thoughts.

You’ve done this before.
Your fear is a panting dog.
Don’t you remember?

Shut out the memory.
Grit your teeth. Clutch the blanket
Don’t answer the phone.

Lie still in the dark
You don’t know who is screaming
It could be yourself.

Wounded animal
A dog howling Cats yowling
You’re safe here in bed.

Glass slices the flesh.
Needle stitches the wound closed.
Mama wildcat screams

She’s out of her mind
Lights on but no one is home
Don’t you remember?

You’re out of your mind
Is it your fault she’s bleeding?
Don’t answer that door