I Don't Remember

I remember, back when life was normal and I was studying on the MA in Creative and Life Writing at Goldsmiths College, in the spring of 2019, Blake Morrison, who taught the Life Writing module, asked us students to do writing exercises in class. I remember that each week he asked us to write for ten minutes or so, then read out what we’d come up with. We never knew what the exercises would be so it was all rather nerve-wracking. Strangely, I don’t remember what any of those exercises were except for one called ‘I remember’. It was simple and predictable enough. We had to write a list of things we remembered, anything at all, beginning each time with the words 'I remember'. I think the idea was that it might spark something we could later develop into a longer piece. Or maybe Blake got fed up with the sound of his own voice and wanted a break? I do remember that I immediately thought of a person: my paternal grandfather, and thought I might write a list of what I didn’t remember, ending with something I did. I sent it to my father afterwards so I was able to look back for it just now in the email. That email is dated February 16th, 2019. Remember what life was like back then? Me too. Anyway, here it is...

I Don’t Remember.

I don’t remember what date it was, or what day of the week it was, or even, to be honest, what year it was, but I do remember how hard his face was – and ice cold to the touch – as he lay in his coffin.

I don’t remember what the funeral director said, or what I said, or what anybody said, but I do remember that he used to say - “It’s only me!” when he came into our house, opening the front door without knocking because he didn’t need to.

I don’t remember what the funeral was like, or what the humanist-guy was like, or even what the day was like, but I do remember what the music was like because it was Kathleen Ferrier singing ‘What is life to me without you?' and it made my grandmother sob, so then I had to turn my head away and concentrate very hard on the EXIT sign above the door, repeating its four letters over and over to myself – E-X-I-T, E-X-I-T, E-X-I-T – so I wouldn’t break down.

I don’t remember what happened about the coffin. Did it glide away slowly? Were curtains pulled around it? But I do remember thinking that the rose I had placed in there next to him would be engulfed in the same flames that licked, then consumed, his silver-grey hair, his well-trimmed beard, his face, his limbs, all his organs, right down to his heart.

Most of all I remember what he was like when he was alive.

That’s it. It's probably the closest thing to a poem I've written since I was a child when I used to write poems all the time. Here’s a photograph of me with my grandfather and grandmother and little brother, taken a long time ago in the garden of their bungalow in the Malvern Hills. My grandfather was called Roy Francis Campbell and I simply adored him. 

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