What They Gave (for my brother, Larry)

1.
I wanted to talk, just you and me your
girl Linda, blown away: her eyes,
still mirrors. (Stepfather’s impotent
rage, falling drunk all over her words,
his gun. And then she’s dead.
And the old man? He probably fell too.
Passed out, wetting himself,
under all those fierce stars.)

Next to the garage we sat, talked
in high weeds, streetlight. Tears you had
rubbed away flattened the blond hair high
on the walls of your cheeks. You said
what you could-everything around you
still tangible: the wood that made up
the houses, the buzz in the light overhead.
A cricket, next to you, with its
black lines, incredible hinges.
Wonder and death. Who could make this?
Who would?

2.
Physical affection did not run in our family.
Our parents had to watch from a distance
as the dust of all those summer days, the tears,
gave us a skin.

This is what they gave.

David Craig