Magdalena Ball - City Child 6 - Memory and Sleeping Pills

Memory and Sleeping Pills

Not everything in the memory

banks is linguistic

tapping into pre-language experiences

requires a different mode

a blurring of the distinctions

between speech-specific processes

and other forms of perception.

I wasn’t quite one

I had a few words

for example, I was able to shout “Mommy”

while banging on the bathroom door

I was able to walk, label things

to clearly articulate what I wanted

I didn’t know the word for fear

it was more of a smell, a colour, a sensation

with its origins in the stomach

rather than the prefrontal cortex

I felt it coming on

a buzz through the skin

a sensation I could do nothing about

my mother was tired, pacing the small apartment

not cooking, not eating, just crying

I was too little

aware but not aware

in the moment when she disappeared

into the bathroom of endless sleep

I knew I had to get that door to open

so I banged, chubby fingers blackening

against the solidity of that door

I shouted until the sound of my voice was 

pure vibration

I don’t remember what happened

beyond that point

help must have arrived

at the hospital

my grandmother spoke sharply

to my coughing, teary mother

about my future and her obligations

she took over our house

cleaning, cooking, sorting, smoothing

the smell of fresh coffee 

penetrating my pores, teaching me 

what safety meant

after that language flooded in

and everything changed.