Making the Connection

Dedicated to me, for missing yet another scholarship deadline


I could have sworn I saw my brother in your eyes
except for the fact that you look better and haven’t come to realize
that the photograph I hold in my hand is of you,
a thousand miles away covered in disappointment, sweat, and tears.
I want to say that you look lost with a touch of anger
because I find myself in the same position, the same pain, only quieter.
These tears are salty because this report card is bad and
I just might not go to college and help the world as I’d planned.
Every C,D, and F is another itinerary cancelled
and for some reason…I don’t think you’d appreciate that.
You see my brother from another brother and another world entirely
we are connected you and I.
How I can’t say yet, but because of you I must try.
Pretty words can only get me so far
and Pretty grades can’t tell what I do out of home;
while you were playing with sticks
and breaking calcified bones
My Words have been spilling stories of Israel and Palestine
of how I wish that their governments would drop more than just lifelines
…tales of a president beyond color and past within the U.S.
of how hope could eventually ease our struggles and all of our distress.
Stories last a lifetime if the words are on paper
and as if by your persistence,
my personal library continues to grow greater.
The stories I read and the stories I tell
have taken up my time and so in school I don’t do well.
Instead, I tell people to lean, to listen now and then
Focus on the bigger picture, don’t try and pinpoint the when.
I’ll take own advice and I won’t crumple your photo
I will dry my eyes, still insisting on some greater good .
The next A is for you,
I know this although nothing is set in stone
I’m going to find myself just for you,
and together
we’re coming home.

Fuller.D