A giant bed.
A giant man, lying.
A plate on his chest.
Life to be devoured.
Record player bumping across the house.
60s jam bands. Live albums.
8-tracks stacked on a bookshelf.
Cheap westerns. Destroyer novels.
Richard Pryor. Redd Foxx.
The smell of stale rot.
No woman has ever been in there.
A bathroom we never use.
Band posters on the wall, The Guess Who.
Mountain on the stereo.
My brother, pontificating about each band.
Listen to this solo.
He wanted to be a drummer,
but never learned to play.
A ping-pong table, replaced by a spare bed.
We used to chase each other with his dirty socks.
He managed the fish shop in the winters,
worked long hours driving a combine,
cutting levees in the rice fields
with me and my father.
The sun, a constant weight.
Man made from mud returning to mud.
Me, complaining.
Me, lecturing the air.
Me, so young and unloved.
Him, listening.