It’s hard to say what we’ve missed
in these years, you not even
solid enough to be a memory
or maybe not even a brother,
but simply an absence,
like a promise broken
or an approaching front
that builds but doesn’t fall
so its cold can’t kiss
your waiting face,
yet you were there
just in time to point a finger
at our mother’s cancer,
to run into the burning building
for her, selfless lamb.
Still you’re always here,
a cloud above the roof
you move and shift your shape
like horizons in a changing sky
sometimes threatening storms
that rattle windows
and other times only leaving
shadows where sunlight
should have settled.