6 poems

Poems About Losing a Brother

Six original poems about losing a brother, from the first stunned days to the ordinary memories that keep returning.

A brother can be witness, rival, protector, nuisance and keeper of a private version of childhood. Losing him alters more than the present; it changes who can confirm the old stories.

These poems do not prescribe a way to grieve. They move through practical tasks, anger, humour, silence and the moments when memory arrives without warning.

quiet·reflection

The Second Key

Your key still hangs behind the clock,
labelled in your hurried capitals.

Nobody needs it now.
The lock was changed in March.
Still, I leave it there—
a small piece of useless metal
that once knew how to let you in.

tender·memorial

Inventory After the Funeral

Three black ties returned to their drawers.
Two borrowed dishes by the sink.
One chair carried back from the hall.

Your coat, impossible arithmetic,
still holding a bus ticket,
a mint sealed in silver paper,
and the shape of one shoulder.

warm·reading

The Story Only You Could Correct

At dinner I tell them about the river,
how I slipped and you pulled me out.
They laugh in the proper places.

But you would interrupt here:
I pushed you, you would say.
You ruined my shoes.

Without you, I am becoming
too innocent in every memory.

raw·reflection

Voicemail

I deleted the message by accident—
your voice asking whether I had a ladder,
nothing worth keeping, I thought.

Now every ordinary question
sounds like a door closing:
got a minute, are you home,
can you bring the blue drill.

raw·reflection

Anger With Nowhere to Go

I was saving an argument for you.
It had evidence, dates,
a sentence sharpened for the end.

Death, badly mannered,
left before hearing my side.

So I walk the long road home
carrying both our stubbornness,
and neither of us wins.

hopeful·memorial

Brothers’ Weather

Some days grief is weather:
not a storm, only pressure,
the whole sky leaning lower.

Then a song from your first car
comes through a supermarket speaker
and there you are—
windows down, singing badly,
alive for exactly three minutes.