the truth about memories

people talk about pictures not molding with memories,

how the photographs don't tell the story 

and how the stories look better on paper.

but you're wrong if you don't think

those picture spell out every inch of my adventures

because my adventures all looked better in person.

writing has cured every stress in my bones

but it never made memories look better on paper.

it's never made sounds like Friday night and clinking bottles

or smelled like cream sodas.

it never put hands between hands

or mimicked her laugh

or touched its lips to me.

and these words,

they put memories back into my hands

but they can't put my hands back into those memories.

 you should've seen us girls, wearing red lipstick

to prove that we could be in love and still make it to dinner on time

and no, we didn't wash our hair,

but we slept in cars

and we slept in the rain

and we slept on the upside of down.

and every second changed our heartbeats

in a way these words could never do justice.

and I wish I could draw that for you,

her hair

and his eyes

and their stains and chipped nails and drawings.

but it doesn't look half as beautiful

on paper.

so I'll write my memories,

but they won't smell half as strong

on paper.

we woke our visions up at 6am 

and poured them onto canvases in a quiet place.

and yes, "we painted on the lake in the morning" sounds just as euphoric

but it doesn't tell the story.

it doesn't tell the story

like 9 hamburgers and melted ice cream does.

it doesn't talk like lost keys and a fishing hat

and, goodness, I could watch him read on the lake all day.

and these memories sound beautiful on my tongue

but it's only an aftertaste,

because I can't make my stories sound half as good 

on paper

as they felt, 

tumbling out of our eardrums and eye sockets

in the form of everything 

but tears.

memories are tokens that God gave to cash in

whenever we wanted to remember 

the way hair falls

and fingers collide

and heartbeats loosen and tighten 

to the sound of footsteps.

those tokens get exchanged for our words

and we built our history out of them.

and those memories still light you on fire

but they won't burn you down 

like the adventures did.

capture your heartaches in the form of verbs and analogies,

and books you loved

and people you didn't.

but make your memories

out of deep kisses and weather forecasts.

make them feel like warm hands,

first-date-hands,

temporary-tears hands.

but make them 

so when you write them down

they take every particle of thought

 and every inch of your bones

to sound half as beautiful

on paper

as they felt.