Recovered Pieces

We manage our memory;
remember what we will
—if we will. We’re careful.

What we did or should have done;
was done to us that we should not
have allowed or could not prevent
—too hurtful, too painful to own,
today, we covertly, deftly, place
in unlit rooms with unmarked doors,
lest they skew the story we
imagine for ourselves.

In scattered moments of brave,
hopeful self inspection we unearth
the broken fragments, guarded memories
—revelations from our past.
We redesign our mosaic of Self,
make space for the recovered pieces,
which of course were always there.