If I had a dollar for every time I saw Mama cry
I wouldn't be asking you for money all the time
And you lived your whole life with a bunch of lies
And I stay up late at night
Praying that you'd come home to apologize
But then I realize
Why should I even care?
It's hard to imagine that you were ever there
Cuz you've been gone for so long
And what you did to us was so wrong
Long nights waiting by the phone
In hopes that you would come back home
And the next day the doorbell finally rang
I open it only to find you wearing a wedding ring
Yeah...
Thanks for the invite
A wedding photo without your own family
What a sight
And what a fight
Well, what did you expect?
That we'd take you in our arms
Like your decisions were correct?
Kinda hard to keep positive
With your constant disrespect
Drilling holes behind our back
I guess now the ship is wrecked
And how will we keep sailing
When the captain ain't even on deck?
And yeah...
Sure you got everything you need
But no matter how much you beg and plead
You can never be forgiven
For the pain Mama has been in
Why can't you stop for once and listen?
Listen to the sorrow she hides inside
Do you hear it?
Cuz I hear it every night
When you left, you took a piece of our hearts
And now it's tearing us all apart
I wish I could rewind right to the start
When there wasn't an emptiness in your room
When I'd look at the clock and know you're coming home soon
Do I hate you for all that you've done?
How could I...when you're my mothers son?
So I guess I have to love you
But right now,
I don't even know you.

Dear Brother, do you still believe in Santa Claus?
Whose cold nose matches your ****** one,
Who falls down chimneys like you are pushed down stairs,
Who is isolated at the North Pole as much as you are in the world.
And when you asked for friends for Christmas,
You got insults, a broken arm, and a football.

Dear Brother, do you still believe in a God?
Who could walk on water
But not get your head out of the toilet.
Who gave Moses the power to part the Red Sea,
But not your sea of helpless tears.
Who answers all prayers,
But replied to yours with a loud, defeated silence.

Dear Brother, do you still believe in love?
That boy you met with hazel eyes and a heartbeat
Was a stronger drug than ones you use now.
But left you more broken than the ***** ever did.
You stitched yourself up, only to fall flat again
In love, hate, then shattering like the beer bottle
When you discovered he was only taking a bet.

Dear Brother, do you still believe in life?
Between drugs and drinks, have you found peace?
Or a reason to live, in deep depths of the night?
Do you know Spring comes after Winter
And solemn clouds fall, fail, forfeit to the sun?
Your Earth was stopped, turned away from the light
Leaving you in the cold, trapped between nightmares.

Dear Brother, I hope you believed in the afterlife
After your stomach spit out the sadness-stopping pills.
After your wrist wrote scars like lyrics to the beat of silent screams.
After I ran in one minute too late.
To see you, hanging in peace from the ceiling fan
Fun, I mean gun, still loaded to your left, so you would not fail, flail, flinch this time.
With a note to the right with three words:
*“Dear Sister,
No.”

Fight after fight
Testosterone and rebellion
Then a few hours of peaceful, play-pretend
But I know things
Things you don't know I know
You wait til late to begin again
You see, our wall is paper thin

2 am
You say it's a hunting game
Although I see she's your aim

Boy, you're worth so much more
Yet you've stooped down several levels
Don't listen to the devils

3am
She's not just a friend
I'm waiting to hear you say
"Thee end"

Young man, you've started  digging where I already dug a tunnel
And once it starts caving
There's no way to funnel the regret

4am
don't pick the floor
Your choices they've been so poor

Bud, you've got a huge life ahead of you
This path could ruin it
Don't let her pull you with a bit

I don't want to see you fall to pieces in a heap
Don't cash yourself as cheap
Little brother
Please, get some sleep

On road trips
we would use each other
as pillows

Brother to window
sister to shoulder
brother to shoulder
sister to window
Are we there yet?

I mean,
Are we grown up yet?

Brother to work
sister to rehab
brother to work
sister to school

No matter the pattern
we all appear
leaning on love
and blood

For my brother, it meant everything
to stretch out and press
his face against the pane
of candy stretched crystalline.

To take the path away from father
for me one step away from
step-mother,
baking our dreams into
crumbs we left on the floor.

We’ll trace them back
to the place between
lost and found,
once we’ve fulfilled
our parts,
he’d always tell me.

But he doesn’t understand,
and honestly when does he,
that we’ve been doomed
from the start.

There is no Gretel,
to stoke the logs,
close the grate and latch
no heroine to fit the story’s need
there's only me

So when the witch comes back
she’ll ask
has Hansel truly grown fat?
a little pinch of the skin
an inadvertent test to see
which one of us should win?

It’s always an offering
always a suffering
always a surrender
of what makes me, she
and Hansel truly him

But I don’t mind
filling this role
I know it’s what I was made for
half baked like the crumbs
in a crummy oven
the real Gretel’s long gone
so her understudy will do.
If Mother could bake one daughter
why not try to bake two?

The witch will say it’s time
and ask me to reach back far
to find a warmth she can't see
it’s really not that odd
to hear the words escape me:
"why don't you try,
it's utterly exhausting
always having to hide"
and besides
I always desperately wanted
someone to show me

And I’ll even smile
as the crackle burns for just awhile
Hansel holding my hand
my pigtails askew.

The crumbs, our true
parents,
eaten in the leaves.