This was a poem that one of the students
today asked me to read.
And I'm happy to do that.
It's called, "The Familiar Itch."
And it's about--
I have a younger brother.
And I wasn't the best older brother.
And that's what this poem is about.
"The Familiar Itch."
If I happen to see a kid picking on his younger brother,
and if the little one looks cowed beyond what
the moment warrants-- then I figure
the one knocks the shit out of the other
when the parents are absent.
Big brothers are such small gods.
Seeing a scene like that I feel again the familiar itch
to get the kid alone somewhere, lean far into him with my eyes,
and slap him hard.
And when the whir in his ear dies, when fury,
shame, shock, and fear all rise--
to whisper, "That is how he feels, every time,"
and leave him there--
the way my father, youngest of two, left me, agape,
the last day I beat my brother.