Forget-Me-Not

My brother is dying and I am not.

I drag him behind me like a spiritless balloon, like the first robot,

like the last clown-car clown, his ridiculous Fiat, his lot

to be crushed, left for dead, covered in snot,

his puffy hands, his outsized shoes, his flower pot,

like Virgil Earp, Clanton-ganged, at the Not

OK Corral, un-brothered, gutshot,

like the night without sleep in Turandot.

From the get-go I have always sought

to know (what, what?) if this is all I’ve got,

to show up in a vestibule, all bothered and hot,

like silver-fingered Iscariot,

like the smiling highwayman, tlot-tlot, tlot-tlot,

while all about me are consigned to slather and rot.

I drink to my faith, to what I am not,

to all who’ve come before me, every rutty Lancelot,

every Huguenot, every hotsy-totsy hot to trot, every Dylan, besot,

who doesn’t have the strength to get up and take another shot.

I know my Morse, code blue, dot-dot-dot, dit-dit-dit, dot-dot-dot.

I know what God hath wrought.