Member-only story
The Fires
what we choose to forget
so much attention was paid to Notre Dame that summer it went up in flame
I had just returned from Paris. we had just ended
whatever it was we were that spring. it was never the same
our love was a monument on which that city depended
we forgot. we wanted to forget the homes razed elsewhere
far away from the city we admired and detested. to those who lost everything, Paris was only a name and Notre Dame
an excuse to focus on something, anything else
but the ashes that once protected the holy
no longer protect us from inconvenient memory
the unfortunate want us to hear them, but they are silent against
the cruel backdrop of publicity. Notre Dame
was so easy to remember, and not us, and not them
we wanted to forget our love, to toss it aside
like detritus on the metro steps leading to a train
that would take us to Notre Dame that spring
it was inconvenient. inconvenience is a young woman shamed for transgressions no one taught her to understand, a woman
who wanted to love and ended up loving a monument to Love…
