REMEMBER BANANAS?

Remember q-tips? Paper towels? Make-up remover wipes?

Remember how we complained about the weather and used electricity to sharpen our pencils, dry our hair, say hello?

Remember how far apart we lived from the people we loved, from other people, from the forest birds, from farms, and factories, and fish?

Remember how impatient we became when a package, huffed by coughing ship across the world, conveyed by conveyor belt and exhausted hands, was delayed in transit? 

Remember shoes with plastic soles and colored laces? Remember throwing them away, in a plastic can lined with a plastic bag to be crushed in the stinking jaws of a metal truck and buried unmarked in the dirt? 

Remember cigarettes? Sliced bread? Blush? Hot showers? 

Remember worrying about how to make rent? Student loan payments? Dinner?

Remember wanting to bring children into the world because the world was, for all its complexity, a place where children were living, large-eyed wishes, where a person might reach and aspire and relax and contemplate and enjoy a plate of imported olives and a glass of old wine and tomatoes fed with rich soil and ripened on the vine?

Remember fame? Hatred? Pigeons? Checkbooks? Violins? Couches? Caterpillars? Copper pots? Cellar doors? Computers? Canvas? Sweatpants? Snow? Pets? Lovers? Snails? Singing? Whales?

Remember me?
Remember me?