My Brother, My Blood

 2017 stole you from me, Keith.

My brother.

My blood.

And still, every year when your birthday comes,

the ache opens fresh,

as if the years in between

were just a blink.

You were never just the needle,

never just a headline in the mind of strangers.

You were the boy who shared my childhood air,

the same roof, the same parents,

the same scraped knees on summer pavement.

We were woven from the same thread—

two pages in the same book.

I’ve buried too many friends to count,

watched that same dark tide

pull them under.

But this…

losing you…

it was like losing part of my own skin.

I’ve kept my hands clean—

no drugs, no drinking—

since I was young,

thinking maybe that would be enough

to hold on to the ones I love.

But it wasn’t.

Now, I take the weight of my grief

and press it into art—

brush strokes that know your face,

colors that speak your name.

Still, there’s a corner of my mind

that whispers maybe.

Maybe one more call,

one more sentence,

could have bent your path toward light.

But Keith,

I loved you with the only hands I had.

And those hands still hold you—

in the blues of a sky you’ll never see again,

the gold of mornings you slept through,

and the red that runs through me,

the same red that ran through you.

My brother.

My blood.

You’re in the colors now.

And I will never put the brush down.