A Forgotten Word

We sat across the Formica,

coffee cooling, steam gone.

You asked me something simple,

about remembering. And I began

to hunt.

My tongue, a thick, slow thing,

tripped over consonants,

a foreign country,

the gates closing, rusty.

'Recuerd… no, uh, recordar?'

It was like trying to catch smoke.

Your eyes, kind, waiting,

as I fumbled, the Spanish

I once spoke with ease,

now just a few loose coins

clattering in a hollow tin.

The silence grew,

a small, hot shame in my throat.

It used to be a river,

now it's just a cracked-up bed.

A word lost, and with it,

a little piece of the old me,

shriveled and dry.