I remember your first guitar,
the first song you learned to play,
Smoke, Smoke on the Water.
I remember Led Zeppelin’s Stairway
to Heaven came next. Rose, do you
wanna smoke?
I’ve got some weed, you’d whisper
through my bedroom door,
knowing I’d put down my book to get
high in your abscess.
With bastard hands and spidered fingers, you’d play
Stairway for me.
I don’t remember when the song ended or when you
stopped strumming your homeless strings.
Now, I watch you suffocating beneath
oil and perlite, your teeth have become ash. You don’t
smoke weed anymore;
haven’t for a long time.
You knock on my bedroom door,Rose, I need a ride to
South Minneapolis, take me to Mid-Town Global Market.
I don’t want to go.
I pretend you’re not sick.
At least you’re not drinking anymore,
but I don’t want to go. I can’t stand
the sound of you puking in the bathroom, to watch you curl
into the couch.
On the way, I cry to you
I beg you to stop.
Don’t look at me like that, you say,
Don’t fucking judge me.
I’m not, I lie, you don’t have to do this. Look at it this way,
I’m giving you something to write about.
I don’t want to write you like this,
I don’t want to write a poem about addiction.
I don’t want to frame you, little brother, inside that word.
You are so much more.
I’ve avoided my pen, let it accumulate dust,
because I knew it would bleed your name
and I’d have to carve you into my femur
to keep you close to me.
When we get to the Market
you tell me to walk around,
check it out, grab a bite to eat,
you’ll be back in 30 minutes.
Then you leave me.
I pretend you’re not sick.
I look at jewelry,
I like the hand-made pieces, the art, the clothes.
I cover my face with silk,
and pretend you’re not sick.
On the way home you’re more yourself,
or at least you want to talk now.
You talk about building fences, buying a truck,
getting back on your feet.
You talk about buying a guitar
and wanting to play again.
I look down at your hands,
your bastard hands,
the ones that just betrayed your body,
held the needle, told the lie.
It was never warm inside her womb.
I wonder if you can ever trust them again
to make something beautiful.