5 Brother poems

Tonight my brother, in heavy boots, is walking through bare rooms over my head, opening and closing doors. What could he be looking for in an empty house? What could he possibly need there in heaven? Does he remember his earth, his birthplace set to torches? His love for me feels like spilled water running back to its vessel. At this hour, what is dead is restless and what is living is burning. Someone tell him he should sleep now. My father keeps a light on by our bed and readies for our journey. He mends ten holes in the knees of five pairs of boy’s pants. His love for me is like his sewing: various colors and too much thread, the stitching uneven. But the needle pierces clean through with each stroke of his hand. At this hour, what is dead is worried and what is living is fugitive. Someone tell him he should sleep now. God, that old furnace, keeps talking with his mouth of teeth, a beard stained at feasts, and his breath of gasoline, airplane, human ash. His love for me feels like fire, feels like doves, feels like river-water. At this hour, what is dead is helpless, kind and helpless. While the Lord lives. Someone tell the Lord to leave me alone. I’ve had enough of his love that feels like burning and flight and running away.

My brother, in his small white bed, held one end. I tugged the other to signal I was still awake. We could have spoken, could have sung to one another, we were in the same room for five years, but the soft cord with its little frayed ends connected us in the dark, gave comfort even if we had been bickering all day. When he fell asleep first and his end of the cord dropped to the floor, I missed him terribly, though I could hear his even breath and we had such long and separate lives ahead.

I had a little brother And I brought him to my mother And I said I want another Little brother for a change. But she said don’t be a bother So I took him to my father And I said this little bother Of a brother’s very strange. But he said one little brother Is exactly like another And every little brother Misbehaves a bit he said. So I took the little bother From my mother and my father And I put the little bother Of a brother back to bed.

Brother, I’ve seen some Astonishing sights: A lion keeping watch Over pasturing cows; A mother delivered After her son was; A guru prostrated Before his disciple; Fish spawning On treetops; A cat carrying away A dog; A gunny-sack Driving a bullock-cart; A buffalo going out to graze, Sitting on a horse; A tree with its branches in the earth, Its roots in the sky; A tree with flowering roots. This verse, says Kabir, Is your key to the universe. If you can figure it out.

My brother and i are very different and also exactly the same when it matters when it matters we're the same person