the coming days are like
a tidal of white walls

as children, my brothers
and i used to put our
crayons and markers
at work

i wrote my name
in cursive on my
wall, my brothers

drew big circles,
then little circles within
the big ones

and we stood back
like a live audience
with our mouths
agape

there was no such thing
as constructive criticism
at the time; 'yours
*****' seemed
to suffice

but even then,
that got boring

had i known i could
have had a hand in
shaping a sibling
into a spray paint
tagging maestro

i would have said:

i see what you're
trying to do there,

it's a human
being plastered
across a blank
sky

give it some life,
a little color;

like you are
handing over
a full heart
to all that empty space