Nostalgia is a gun that backfires
Alan Watts drank himself to death at 58.
Ralph Towner died at 85 years old.
My grandparents lived into their 90s.
Me, I’m looking through old photos
on a hard drive in my bedroom,
wondering where the years have gone
and what I was doing while they were passing.
I see my friends’ kids laughing.
My own kids laughing.
There are former lovers and partners,
friends and collaborators,
minor celebrities and major heartbreaks.
Ones and zeroes translated into
ones I remember and ones I try to forget.
But there is no forgetting, just incorporating
the names and faces and feelings
into a new version of who I am.
This version will be out of date
by the time I finish this poem,
replaced by a new me who’ll load
the same bullet into the same chamber,
having learned no lessons.
Nostalgia is a gun that backfires,
the shot echoing through the house.
/ / /
21 January 2026
Charlottesville VA
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