It’s Not There by Lou Beach

“It’s not there.”

“What’s not there?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Then how do you know it’s not there?”

“Cuz it’s missing.”

“Come on, that doesn’t make any sense.”

“There are words that have stopped coming to me without some kind of prompt, some sort of…whatchamacallit…”

“Mnemonic device.”

“Right, right. They just disappear when I need them and reappear when it no longer matters.”

“Yeah, well, that comes with age.”

“Like wisdom.”

“Let’s not get carried away here.”

“I mean, I forgot the word ‘celery’ the other day.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, it was way embarrassing.”

“Who were you with?”

“I was by all myself.”

“At the market?”

“No, I was in bed.”

“Oh, that is the worst kind of embarrassed.”

“All alone and grasping.”

“Celery.”

Lou Beach is an acclaimed visual artist and the author of the flash fiction classic 420 Characters. Lou’s 420 Characters has been favorably reviewed by The Paris Review and Electric Literature, among others. There is a lot more about Lou Beach here.