To My Lost Brother

by David Hopkins

At 12 I listened to you scream
in a rasp cry becoming silent

as you took her kicks on the floor
and the wind left with spit from

your gasps and you rolled your
eyes back and left us.

I suppose the shut-off of
tone at that velocity, force and

intensity is to save the vocal chords.
Maybe it comes from more primitive times

when we would have to warn others
after such an attack and so would

for the sake of the species
need to tell our tale.

I wonder if they had catatonics back then,
or if knowing that you would be expected

to share the terror somehow made
you willing to talk. Secret pain meant death.

The new commitment to silence whether for
religious or psychotic reasons seems the same:

There's too much to say for human ears.