inside a leather wallet

I could have put something pathetic up here. Something...less embarrassing than all the others, and I think is actually sort of decent, if not crap. Instead I'm going with something completely different.


my fingers frantically dig through piles
and piles of old memories. There is a ticket
stub I kept from visiting my aunt, the
picture of my old best friend. Finally
my fingers grip the tired
leather of a familiar wallet.

Inside, there is a photograph, slightly
torn just below her hand, and raised from when
I wrote on the back in fury, my
pencil gouging lines into your eyes.

My trembling hands hesitate on the clasp,
suddenly unsure of how to snap it
open. When they do, there's an overwhelming
odor of rust and the scent of being
trapped in a closet for years. I can't

remember why I know the photo so well
or why, when I slip it out of it's home, that it
rests so well on my warm palm.
I think the texture has changed in seven
years, the surface a little less rough, a little
more glossy.

It's one of those professionally taken photos,
with the cloudy blue background and the cheap
smiles that cost far less than their forged copies,
the antiques that don't exist anymore.


all right then.
Heather