My brother is my better half,
or so my father always said.
His hands are rough but neat,
whereas mine are sinewy and strange.
His jaw is square but gentle,
whereas mine is a trough for tilting white tombstones.
His eyes are bright and shiny as copper pennies,
whereas mine glow like the sickly sun on pondwater.
He walks in long, smooth strides
that no one ever doubted
would take him where he wanted to go.
I do not have the confidence to walk so forcefully,
so trustingly.
My brother is the best son my parents could have hoped to have,
and I am not my brother.
But I am also not his flock,
nor am I his keeper.
or so my father always said.
His hands are rough but neat,
whereas mine are sinewy and strange.
His jaw is square but gentle,
whereas mine is a trough for tilting white tombstones.
His eyes are bright and shiny as copper pennies,
whereas mine glow like the sickly sun on pondwater.
He walks in long, smooth strides
that no one ever doubted
would take him where he wanted to go.
I do not have the confidence to walk so forcefully,
so trustingly.
My brother is the best son my parents could have hoped to have,
and I am not my brother.
But I am also not his flock,
nor am I his keeper.