I’ve noticed that the poems I am choosing for my book all have one major thing in common: they are personal and narrative.

Knowing this, I wrote “Chronicle” this morning, trying to capture the chaos yesterday of taking my mom out to eat.

As I started the poem I thought it might be about the many things that have gone wrong for me recently–leaving a book of poetry and my computer outside in the rain while in Maine, my car’s battery being dead this morning, forgetting to ask someone to water our plants while we were gone–but the story of the kitty litter took over.

I only did a minor bit of editing–with the help of my poetry mentor (the share button is disabled for some reason)–mainly to add the dashes so that the poem read better.

Seeing that pile of kitty litter on the floor of my mom’s bathroom was frustrating. I knew the bags tore easily–that’s why I was taking it to the trash can. And yet I had to spin it tighter.

I thought to add a call from my mom last night where she thought that she forgot to go to supper. This was unlikely–someone always comes to get her right around 4:00 p.m.–but she also told me she wasn’t hungry.

This might have been because she ate five of the six homemade chocolate chip cookies that I brought over that morning.

It’s another sign that Mom’s short term memory is really fading. She almost never remembers what she had for a meal even right when she gets back from the meal. She often calls within a few minutes to ask me for a favor–yesterday to call an 800 number for her where they apparently were sending free books about memory loss to each caller.

Mom had written down two numbers but was unsure which was the right number. The second time she called she only remembered that she had two numbers and wasn’t sure why she wanted me to call them.

These are no longer sad stories for me. The thought that makes me sad is Mom sitting on her couch all day (except for meals and sometimes bingo on Tuesdays and Thursdays), usually worrying about things–Zach, her coffee running out, feeling like she’s forgetting something.

This is her life now. That is very sad for me to think about.

So, I write about it. Thus, “Chronicle”.

I’m heading out to check on my truck. I’ve got it sitting on a battery charger. I seem to have to do this a lot–one of the costs of owning a 1994 Ford Ranger, I guess.