I lost my memory

I woke up with a stranger’s name in my mouth

and no idea who it belonged to.

The room felt familiar

the way an old song does

when you can hum the tune

but the words are gone.

There’s a photo on the wall—

two people laughing in sunlight.

I study their faces

like a tourist studying a map

of a city they’re supposed to love.

Sometimes a feeling arrives first.

A warm flicker in the chest.

A sadness with no story.

Maybe memory isn’t the only way

to know a life.

I’m learning the weight of my own hands again,

the sound of my footsteps in the morning.

And tonight I wonder—

if the past never returns,

do I get to become someone new?