Untitled (For Obvious Reasons) Poem by Frank Avon

Words
that have been one's intimates
have cohabited for years
retreat
retire
or (to mix metaphors and senses)
simply disappear.

You need one,
you call it up.
It's gone - AWOL.

You've known it for a long time,
well, since your youth,
back when mild, shy Uncle Ed
in his hospital bed,
dying,
went wild, threshing, ranting,
swearing, yelling obscenities
you're sure he never knew.

Now what's the word for that?
It's hidden. It resists,
refuses to reenlist.
Not Alzheimer's, no, not that,
nor senility -
more vigorous, more rigorous,
I want to say delirium tremens
but, no, no, off altogether,
no, not amnesia either,
but more muscular
than mere forgetfulness,
more crepuscular,
or do I mean corpuscular. Hmm,
I'm not sure. Scratch that.

The word's dug itself in
a ditch, a delve, a crater,
and won't come out.
I thresh and turn about,
duh and uh and er,
taste it in my mouth,
but, no,
it just isn't there,

Leave it blank, they tell you.
It'll come to you later.

That was yesterday,
how long must I wait?

to tell you about the early stages
(when words you need are in absentia) ,
the first phases

of _________________________.