The Origin of Memory

Memory lives in bones, I’d say:

it’s the marrow of it.

Once there was a woman made of leather;

old, ancient, like the blood of my ancestors.

She ripped away flesh with her pointed teeth, grinning,

then bone was clean and when she sucked the marrow

everything became— past, present, future. Well,

isn’t it all the same? Your blood is my blood

is his blood is her blood, so, we all hold the same

hurt, anger, fear, instinct for survival and

we carry it, pass it on, forget it except 

we feel it in our bones. The marrow is the memory.

Therefore, when I feel the visceral pang of

longing, sadness, hunger for being known, seen,

it is the memory of the thousands before me.

Wind whips through my hair, the emotions in the pit

of my stomach match its speed, intensity;

I want to scream. For my mother and her mother and

right down the line. Let me

pull my hair out at its roots so maybe

the memory will leave me; unchain me; set me free.