I used to worry
that they'd send you away
to a life of imprisonment
because they hated you so
for no reasons they could explain
I used to worry
because their tread marks
were in our driveway anytime
they needed someone to try and pin things on
though you were never less than honorable
polite, personable, my genuinely good brother
I never used to worry
that they'd one up my worries
and send you somewhere further away than prison
I never used to worry that the forces
meant to uphold law and justice
to serve and protect
would walk blindly past the line
of no return, to botch their expected standards
while watching you slip away
I never used to worry
that there was an evil force within some people
that could destroy the glue holding our family
together, then again I was so young
so naive, to think that people were instinctively good
that people, having families of their own
would never purposefully tear apart another's
but I don't suppose they ever thought of me
and your kin, or beyond that need to bring you down
I never used to worry that the system would fail
allowing guilty parties to walk free,
to have families of their own; to not even recognize the fault and
to protect the ones who took you away
I used to worry that they'd try to send you
to a life of imprisonment, and in the end
they did send you away,
but it is a place where I cannot visit
and instead it is us, who love you so,
imprisoned in what we call life, where the fences are
the breaths I take, the steps I walk, the beats of my heart
the walls that confine me and separate me from the world
are the memories and lost time, and of only knowing you
through my childhood eyes
and the guards and wardens are the haze which clouds
my thoughts, unable to still hear your voice or see your face
in my mind
and my day of release will only come
when I walk through the gate, past the fences
to the afterlife, where my life will finally begin again.