KENNY

a reflection upon the passing of my older brother, once my closest family member.

KENNY

 

I wonder how my brother died.

 

We knew he was in the street.

We heard he was skin and bones.

Not shot, or stabbed, no.

But not at peace, in bed.

 

I wonder when my brother died

did he cry for Ma, who cried for him

the only tears I ever saw her cry?

 

Did he smile at joining Champ, and Lady,

and Duke, our pets, and Pop our pop?

Did he know how we would miss

his smile, his dancing, the way he

did the things he did?

 

Did the virus get him down, or the pipe

cause a final rough landing, or was it

his heart, broken too long or one time too many?

 

Kenny came home in and urn , ashes to ashes

and dust to enshroud the memory of

the sweetest, frailest one of our stout clan.

 

We said ... we didn't want to know.

Not murdered, then dead was dead.

But today I thought of him all day

 

And tonight, I wonder how Kenny died.

Reviews

[just rose.]

This is incredibly, incredibly painful and tremendously well expressed. You combine nostalgia and that deep, inexpressible love that siblings have for one another, even when apart, with the distance of estrangement in ways that one can only comprehend if one has been there. So much sadness here. The first line is a tremendous hook, the lines about the pets and the others who have passed are so familiar to me with all the losses my family has sustained. And so we remain longing and wondering at the poem's close, as the narrator does too.