Brothers Poem by David L Falcon

today
i rode my bike
near the river
we'd known as kids
the houses hefted on stilts
legacy of the 50's floods
the tracks along the banks
as lonely as our empty house

i thought of something you said
as we chipped up to the eighth green
at cabramatta last week
we were near the creek
and you said
you couldn't understand
why they didn't clean it up
so people could put boats in and use it

We haven't learned even yet to hug
But I heard in your words the loss

i saw again for a moment
rowboats for hire
kids dropping from a rope tied high in the trees
oars slapping in rowlocks as fathers
rowed their sunday families upstream