Brothers

by Hassen Hassen

Poetry, Arlington County Detention Facility/Heard/OAR writing contest, August 2022

 

How can we protect our goals;

When we are not being keepers of each other souls?

Obsessed with our past;

too blind to see our present.

Too caught up in current trash;

To understand our future’s present.

In a tureen; lost in a sea of oblivion;

looking for away out; out this morass material.

Reaching for a hand; to pull us up.

Event a rope or a ladder might make us jump.

Shedding tears of joy; and smiles of sorrow;

painfully hoping and happily despiring.

With pain so deep, like the marrow’s in our bones;

And comradery so fake, like a cartoon’s souls.

We both hungry for just a little refuge;

But, all we feed each other is plates of subterfuge.

Brainwashed to inure less;

When we are supposed to be our best.

How do we protect our goals;

When we are not keepers of each other souls?

So, place me deep, where you look within;

abyssed in your soul when you need a friend.

Place it dearly next to your heart,

But never negated when we are apart.

And even thought we have different mothers;

That doesn’t mean we can’t be prison brothers.