Have You Seen My Story?

Lyric Essay About Identity and Memory

intro:

This is a lyric essay about identity and memory follows a narrator who has lost their story and searches for it through surreal encounters with a friend, an old lover, and a dead mother. Each doorway reveals someone else’s version of the narrator—none of which is the one they seek.

The Essay

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it seems that You have lost your story, so you put on a threadbare black coat for the snow and visit the homes of those who know you. You knock on the first door, and your friend answers dressed in a lab coat. You ask him, “Have you seen my story.” He proceeds to tell you his story of you, but it is not what you are looking for. You shake your head. He shakes his head, shuts the door slower than the drying of a wet coat. You stand in front of the door, watching the band of light slowly thin from its closing.

You walk to the next door at the end of an endless hallway. You knock, and your old lover answers. She’s 10 Feet tall and is hunched over; with her shoulders pressed against the ceiling. You ask her if she has seen your story, as you seem to have lost it and are wondering if you left it there when you were once in love.

She tells you the story of why she left you and other things she has written about herself to expain it to herself. As she tells you her story about you, she gets smaller and smaller. It’s not what you’re looking for. She is so small now, a rat from the back room is staring at her. You pull the door shut.

You then go to the storage unit where your dead mother lives, black birds nesting on the roof. You lean to the ground and knock on the side of the wall. ‘Mother, have you seen my story? It appears that I have lost it.” She is so tired, she can only whisper. She tells you the stories of the martyrs’ lives. It’s not what you are looking for. You stand up, lean your weight against the wall. The snow has begun to fall again, and the streetlight makes the flakes fall in slow motion.

You feel as though you are moving in slow motion, too. You walk away from the storage unit and stare at the new blanket of white snow that glistens like the eyes of a thousand readers gathered around a warm fire. The snow makes everything so quiet that you swear you can hear a candle burning in a window across the street.

© 2025 Chris Leibow — Salt Lake City artist and poet.
poetry, collage art, mixed media,
Explore more art at leibow.art.