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Cup Logo Published on April 05, 2000 by Anthony V. Toscano
For My Brother Who Will Never Read This

The one of us who for a short while clenched
imperial power inside his manicured hands,
hung Brooks Brothers suits on the rack,
his birthday comes this week. Tomorrow. Today

he likely sits inside his coastline mansion,
a shadow slumped into a wheelchair, a recluse
hidden behind his picture window, a morphine
pump dripping timed relief into his spinal column,

a million dollars having babies in the bank,
a hundred ties grown damp inside his closet. Until
I read my mind this morning, I’d forgotten
him, he who bears my casket on his shoulder.

The two of us together, we sound like stereo
signals spitting static through the wire. We sing
rich harmonies without benefit of practice. Both of us
worship Sinatra the Sicilian, chew loud on hard salami,

breathe in deep the aroma of books that make a man
think. We both claim to be right about everything
and wrong about everything else. Too similar, two men,
we condemn each other for the I each one of us sees

inside the you. Stubborn minds, dying hearts, and yet
we taught ourselves that blood can foster the unfair
expectation that brothers should do more than
love each other today, again perhaps tomorrow.


Long Bean Line

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Con affetto,
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Long Bean Line


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