Is This a Real Memory? by Alabel Chapin

IS THIS A REAL MEMORY?

I think I can remember my father shaving his blue jaw in the mirror. I can hear the tap tap of the razor against the porcelain rim of the sink, and I am transfixed by the sharp cut of his face, the way it turns soft and melted in the glass like a sad stranger he and I get quiet, I let him look at himself I let myself look at him the way his chin dips around the stubble like a grey geode, an ancient twinkle this is how he makes himself ready for us, I think, how he seeks solitude this is an old, well-worn moment a sacred, secret majesty I am an onlooker now, just for a moment he has always done this, only I am new Is this a real memory? he told me I liked to sit in the sink and watch him they would bathe me in the sink once my whole body could fold into that little bowl the naked laughing bit of flesh they called by my same name now I can prop one foot on the lip to shave my legs I am waiting for the day when I won’t be this quiet watcher a fabricator of memory for when I will live into the remembering, be eternal

ALABEL CHAPIN