Len Webster's 'Diary-Keeping' Poem by Len Webster

I fill them up,
these bulky notebooks,
fill them up with words;
some crammed into lines
that should be kept clear
except in emergencies
for later notes or comments.

As time passes
the entries grow in length
rather than importance.
I find an incident
triggering a thought and
too chaotic to seek our the original
I rely on memory.

One day I shall sit down
and looking through the links
amaze myself at my powers of recollection
or bemuse myself at the shifting nature
of things believed recalled
but merely fragmented by a process
beyond the conscious mind

and finding myself entangled
look out for signposts
pointing to overgrown paths
leading to unknowable other selves,
never-was or never-did incarnations
swirling in mist.