Poetry By Karen A VandenBos

           ​Tzef Pine CC




Choices

Brother, Sister.
Hearts left to tend.
Four years between us
from beginning to end.

Your music to my poetry.
Your bottle to my pen.
I wish the door would open
and I could see you again.

Your head was meant for chemistry,
mine for literature and verse.
We didn't know at 16 and 12
which choice would be worse.

As we plodded thru the ruins
of our parents divorce,
we each coped in our own way
as it blew our lives off course.

You chose option A
and I went with B.
You saw the bottle as a friend
and I learned it was the enemy.

From dysfunction to destruction
we stayed connected thru the years.
You drank your daily poison
while I wiped away my tears.

I know the pull of numbness,
it beckoned to me too
But I saw the wreckage being done
and I didn't want to be like you.

Drinking dulled your sensitive side,
you thought it made you strong.
The truth is it destroyed who you really were
and that brother is what went wrong.

We never talked about what happened,
the elephant in the room.
We had no map or guide to help
we did not know the rules.

We learned to play our roles,
the innocence was gone.
We were not children anymore
the damage had been done.

You thought that people liked you drunk,
while I wished that you were sober.
You tried rehab at least five times
then gave up and it was over.

You were 50 when we said goodbye
and lost the battle you'd begun.
I loved you, I liked you, I hated you too,
I guess it's all relative in more ways than one.




​
Feasting on Memories

It was ours, the bologna sandwich with one slice of
meat between two pieces of toast slathered with
creamy pearl mayo and sunshine mustard.
The craving always came after smoking pot from
the elephant shaped bong in your room while we
watched late night television like “ The Midnight
Special” or “In Concert”.

After the explosion of music we tip toed down
the stairs to the kitchen for our after hours culinary
delight. After we fried and stacked our bounty
on plates, we headed back up to your room and
ate and laughed our way into the wee hours of
the morning. The empty cans of beer on the floor
by your chair should have set off alarms.

I miss you brother.

Just the other day the longing for one of those
sandwiches set up in my mind after hearing a
poem read that mentioned a similar production.
Perhaps it was that or the fact that the thirteenth
anniversary of your death is almost upon us.

I miss you brother.

I wish we could get together and take over the
kitchen and laugh our way through the sadness
and the years. Maybe this year I will make our
signature sandwich and feast alone on the
memories.




​Once upon a time, Karen A VandenBos was born on a warm July morn in Kalamazoo, MI. She can be found unleashing her imagination in three online writing groups and her writing has been published in Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Blue Heron Review, The Ekphrastic Review, The Rye Whiskey Review, One Art: a journal of poetry and others.