Forgetfulness

Here is another one from Billy Collins that has been on my mind of late. To the degree that it can be. Maybe you can relate.

Forgetfulness

The name of the author is the first to go
followed obediently by the title, the plot,
the heartbreaking conclusion,
the entire novel,
which suddenly becomes one you
have never read,
never even heard of.

as if one by one, the memories you
used to harbor
decided to retire to the southern
hemisphere of the brain,
to a little fishing village where there
are no phones.

Long ago you kissed the names of
the nine Muses goodbye,
and watched the quadratic equation
pack its bag,
and even now, as you memorize the
order of the planets,

something else is slipping away, a
state flower perhaps,
the address of an uncle, the capital of
Paraguay.

Whatever it is you are struggling to
remember,
it is not poised on the tip of your tongue,
not even lurking in some obscure
corner of your spleen.

It has floated away down a dark
mythological river
whose name begins with an 'L" as far
as you can recall,
well on your own way to oblivion
where you will join those
who have even forgotten how to swim
and how to ride a bicycle.

No wonder you rise in the middle of
the night
to look up the date of a famous battle
in a book on war.
No wonder the moon in the window
seems to have drifted
out of a love poem that you used to
know by heart.

---Billy Collins