The Difficulty With Love

The difficulty with love is the word

love.

I can’t tell you how much I love

my brothers.

I can’t tell you,

because I can’t tell them.

It’s not how we work.

Love is not a word

we have in common.

We meet, we eat, we drink.

We talk, though we say little,

and reveal less,

of ourselves, to ourselves.

When we part, we wave, or shrug,

or exchange manly insults,

as you do oop north.

We do not speak of love.

When our sister died,

we cried, but not right there,

not right then.

We went home, we kept

our tears hidden,

for fear of sympathy

and the risk of the word

being spoken.

On the day we gave her

to the eternal flame,

we shared our tears,

in silence.

Again, we showed

we could not speak

of love.