this is the one for
the other boy nursed from her breast,
the boy born in February,
the boy with hair redder than mine.
you who would build houses from refrigerator boxes
with me on the back porch,
holding the knife to cut-cut-cut the doors and windows.
you who once made me a cuckoo-clock from toilet rolls and a diaper carton.
you, the older, the obedient,
the scientist who was spanked for playing with matches.
we would toast at midnight on new year’s
with stem glasses full of ginger ale.
you, not smarter, but studious
as i chose adventure over academia.
you whose heart pumps blood from the same womb,
now content with automobiles and radios
moved from our house to trailer to new house
never leaving the comfort of home.
once we would prank-call until reduced to fits,
once you said the word “faggots”
and ran from me then,
i was taller than you already and
had lost the weight you once derided me for
(which i saw you had been gifted with at Christmas)
and i don’t recall a conversation since.
you who would jump with me off the stairs
into a bean-bag chair when we were home alone.

my brother now is entangled in my destiny,
he believes in magick and in beauty.
we walk through forests as we did in youth,
still see the ghosts and monsters.
nature contrived paternity first
but fraternity, second.

i remember you
as a childhood friend
who moved away, like all the others.