You have always been nosebleed
and nail-bite, the spit-shined halls
where you harvested us with your tribal
clang. Too long we saw your face
in every shadow, felt the whole forest
await your arrival like a nagging frost.
We hid from you in toilet stalls,
quit band to avoid the music
room where you waited near your
locker. Back then, there was nothing
we could say. In death we greet you
now as brothers, your dark
silence wailing from those glittering
trumpets we never learned to play.
ISSUE: Summer 2016