you

little man of golden sand 

you share my face my eyes my blood the tremble of my hand

we've shared rooms and wombs though i breathed first and you tumbled into this earth eighteen months behind

eighteen pages of a calender divide and define but you dont let the world define you, do you

you'd tumble stumble cry and fumble and i'd leave you in the dust to mumble sadly to a mother who wrapped you in her arms

you were tiny and weak and i hung your defeats over you like a switch ripped fresh from a whip thin tree and you'd run so fast from such a little girl

but you were also my best friend

watch a tv flicker as we made games in that tiny bedroom playing tag lava floor pretend

that we were heros meant to serve a better end

than watch a crumbling family full of animostiy the atrocities we saw and heard and shouted when we were barely ten

flicked the switch of our room when he cursed and she cried and we drowned the fighting with tiny chatter louder louder til the dams burst and we sobbed, begging

you

little child of dirty tile

we'd  skid along the kitchen floor in socks and giggle while

he smoked and cried and begged and lied and clenched a little fist

he said he loved her and was wronged and clenched his bloodstained fist

glassy eyes crazed eyes eyeing bottle of medication he was aching for release from this hell that god had taken upong himself to deliver

to an innocent, "dont forgive her"

he cried while we sobbed and left our giggles down the river and we went through hell and high water hand in hand, hoping to peek a head out take a breath before threats could pull us in

he held a candy bottle high above our heads, tipped it back jaw running slack and it tumbled rumbled dead

i screamed, you watched, his self infliected "end"

seared forever in my mind but you dont seem to let it render you immobile uncontrollable you never even graze the conversation of that next morning where he groaned with the sun's rays

you

little boy of broken toys

watched a man take two lives and effectively destroy

them, left a woman a beaten shell and a little girl a lonely whirl of rotting mental hell

in a world that was a whirlwind of shelves and hurt you stood tall and said "no" and left the inert

to their devices

you reach high and low into your mind and this world and you combine what you know and what you dont and ask "why?"

you crawled from the depths of hell with a stump of a heart and a freshly broken ego ergo you should have followed me go

down into self pity and pointless meditations feeling empty soulless nothing without doses of medication

but

you rose above us

gave the past a passing smile before you kicked it into nothing and let the future bear your child

you

a being of the stars

take life by the throat dont let go the past isn't who you are

i know you are more; you've gone for sixteen years sharing my face my eyes my life my blood my silent frightened tears

i'm proud of how your head's held high and long goodbyes are not your style please a stay a while the world's in denial and you can make it see

i love you little brother keep on being who you'll be