For X:

As memory approaches oblivion

For X - a digital collage by Tim Newfields

Memory dims to dust, then drifts to gray,
and still one image will never fade away—
her round, dark nipples, secrets kept from sight,
and the silken softness of her breasts in the moonlight.

Her name has scattered into smoke and air,
but the richness of her dark pubic hair
and how her twin, dark moons of Venus gleam,
still shimmer in my half-awake dream.

Not face, not voice, not what she used to say—
just tenderness that time can't take away,
a color deepening like wine at dusk,
a closeness folded soft as petal-husk.

Those alone, through all the years' slow theft,
that trace alone is what my mind has kept.

Cantara let the poem's last words dissolve into silence, her eyes still resting on the page, as if waiting for the ink itself to settle into stillness. After a long, contemplative pause, she tilted her head. "There's something primal in this," she said softly, her voice threaded with conflicting currents.

"Memory is a curious phenomenon. We can easily forget historical dates, the names of former classmates, or business contacts that once seemed vital. Yet the memory of feeling keenly in love? That refuses to fade."

Chris nodded in slow agreement, leaning back into his chair as a reflective shade crossed his expression. "Yes," he mused, tracing the rim of his coffee cup. "Memory is a strange creature," he said. "We forget historical dates without a second thought. Names of old classmates slip away. Business contacts who once seemed indispensable fade into blankness. But the memory of loving someone completely, desperately? That one refuses to die."

A sardonic smile curved at the edge of Miok's mouth. She lifted her chin, eyes glinting with sharp amusement. "Loving, Chris? Or lusting?" She let the question hang in the air like smoke, unhurried, before adding, "The two are maddeningly hard to tell apart sometimes."

"Indeed," Jules interjected with a faint, knowing smirk, steepling his fingers beneath his chin. "Sometimes it seems as if lust is simply the raw, volatile first stage of romantic love. Given time, it gradually transmutes into something far deeper."

Miok let out a low, dry laugh, her gaze drifting toward the window. ". . . or it doesn't," she said, her voice dipping into something cooler, more cynical. "Sometimes infatuation is entirely vacuous, and nothing more than hollow chaff blown away by the first cold wind."