Kept

I found it in my jacket pocket,

months old, the wrapper loose,

still worth chewing, so I cracked it.

I'm in a meeting, blank and dull.

I slip it in my mouth.

The taste is cinnamon—their brand,

the flavor they used to hand

to me under the table

when my parents weren't looking.

For thirty seconds I'm eight.

They're twelve and they remember I exist.

For thirty seconds that taste persists

and I'm loved.

Then it's just texture,

just rubber I'm moving around,

just jaw and habit and ground

to nothing.

Someone asks me something.

I nod. The gum is flavorless.

I keep chewing anyway, careless,

like I can hold the taste inside,

like my stomach won't divide

me from the memory.

I swallow it.

I don't know why I did that.

But I kept the moment flat

inside me,

tried to make it stay,

tried to make it not fade away.