She doesn’t recollect herself that well.
I met her at 18 and we’ve been close,
but she denies her past. I sometimes tell
her what she said or did, or how she chose
her course, but she’ll debate – she doesn’t feel
as if it went that way. She won’t review
the letters she composed; they’ve no appeal –
she says she isn’t interested in true
as much as in what’s possible right now.

But if today’s a product of the past,
a present made of yesterdays, then how
can we assay ourselves without a cast
back-lit? She doesn’t crave the facts I seek,
but she forgets the things she said last week.