The attic dust a fine silt

The attic dust, a fine silt,

over everything I’d built

and then forgot. This shoebox,

Summer '98. A little shock.

I pulled out film, curled,

and there it was, my small world

reduced to a thumbprint.

A Ferris wheel, blurry red, yellow,

like smeared lipstick, a tired fellow

turning slow. I see the lines

of a half-eaten hot dog. Signs

of a time I’d just let go.

Didn't know it was gone, you know?

The thrill, the cheap sugar high.

It just flew past, under a bruised sky,

until this paper told me so.