Losing Language

     I have been losing the meaning of words.
Not in the way of strokes or amnesia, sudden
concussions - not holding a pear and saying, sock.
A pear is still a pear but it is less than a pear,
its taste not quite so tart or sweet, its juice
barely dribbles and when it does, its stain
washes out swiftly in the washer’s rinse cycle.
And so I repeat my sentences, I sit
and listen to yours, and ask again for you
to repeat, and try to align
these unmelodic measures of stressed and
unstressed syllables with
the ache in my chest.
But years of use renders words faded and
yellowing, memories of memories of what
they were, their truth
slipping away as clear water in a cupped hand.