Before the meningitis, after the endless year in Colorado, and the aftertimes before the children waiting, the myriad memories that rush in and push out the memories I keep remembering, I’d rather not remember and I remember I remember remember

—all but the names, just faces and just feelings just impressions really are all I really remember of the mountainous meningitis and the sadness that came before the happiness that came after the news he was not dead just deaf.

 

Scott Chalupa lives and writes in an attic apartment with doorjambs barely tall enough for head clearance. A winner of the Howard Moss Poetry Prize, he served on the nominating committee for the 2014/15 Houston Public Poetry series. He is currently pursuing an MFA in poetry at the University of South Carolina in Columbia. His work has appeared/is forthcoming in several venues, including Houston NPR, The Allegheny Review, Houston & Nomadic Voices, and Dark Matter.