Brother, we knew each other.
And then it was gone, like laughter on the wind.
It faded to a gentle breeze on my skin.

Brother, we knew each other.
Though, fathers we never knew, we did what we could to become what we wanted.
Things we didn't say, if time had been kinder, you'd have been a great uncle to my kids one day.

Brother, one day I'll find your smile etched in the grass.
The wind still carrying your laugh across those green fields.
I'll carry you with me wherever I've gone, till I'm gone.

I go to work in the same shoes I wore then, the waterstains haven't faded.
The smell of rain on the dirt of my soles, my soul with the colors of rain and soil.

If I cry, will you still smell the rain?

i don't get so sad anymore, you know.
and sometimes i wish i could go back and do things better,
do things right,
but something in me knows it was supposed to end when it did.

you've changed, anyway.

i don't want to say that you're not the person i once knew,
because i'm sure that deep down, somewhere in there, you are,
but i'm a tired person,
and i lack the energy required
to dig down so deep through skin and bone
trying to find the worn out shards of a memory;
the last pieces of the first person to make me feel so terribly alive.

//

i hope you're happy.
i have always hoped that you would be happy.

but i don't get so sad anymore,
and i don't want to linger on the past.

(still i write poems about you, simply for the sake of writing).

//

every now and again,
i'll think about you,
you and everything and everyone else who shaped me.

and it's hard to believe it's been two years.

and it's hard to believe that i have grown,
but i have,
and the truth is that i don't need you anymore.

//

i don't get so sad anymore, you know.
things have gotten better.
you're gone and you don't care and i sometimes wonder if you ever did, but i'm telling you anyway that things have gotten better because i want to prove to myself that it was right to let you go,
that i needed to let you go to finally be free.

you made me feel alive in a way that tugged at my heart with a surprising aggression,
but i deserve better than that.

(a.m.)

for a moment i couldn’t remember your last name.
for a moment it started with a different letter,
was spoken in a different tongue.
for a moment i had forgotten it — that is, if i ever knew it at all.

you used to be so clear to me.
you were, at a time, tangible —
so much more than a memory.
i loved you then and i could say that i love you now but
you cannot love a memory.
not in the same way, no.
you cannot talk to a memory,
nor laugh with a memory,
nor live with a memory.

and so i keep you
frozen in time,
a fragment of the past.

like ashes in an urn i put you on the shelf,
never to be disturbed,
only to be put on display.
i thought you’d be safe there.
i thought that the ashes in an urn don’t disappear because
what more can ash crumble down to?

but today,
for just a moment,
i couldn’t remember your last name.
today,
for just a moment,
you slipped away.

and now i wonder if i ever had you at all.

(a.m.)

i.
hearing your name still fills me with a certain intoxicating sweetness.

ii.
i hate you. god, i hate you so much. but i love you. please come back.

iii.
i'm sorry that it had to end up like this. i don't think you care, though.

iv.
it's okay if you've lost your innocence. i've lost mine, too. life will do that to people.

v.
i was often happiest when you said my name like maybe i meant something to you.

vi.
i am stuck between wanting to forget you and wanting to crawl back to you.

vii.
most of my poems are still about you, even now.

viii.
i hope you're doing okay.

ix.
please don't forget me.

x.**
thank you.