I wonder

What was he thinking
Here,
Amazed and enraptured
In the land of his parents
Before I was born
What was he thinking?
Was his mind as clear as it was when I knew him?
Was it crowded with thoughts of his future?
Or focused and narrow?

I wonder
Because he had no idea then
Where he would be now.

I wonder
Did he leave this place
Caught up in the romance,
The excitement,
His youth—
Take his young bride
With passion
Long into the night,
Is this the day
My brother was conceived?

I wonder
If I could show him
How he would live his life—
Where it all would lead.
The devotion to an absent God,
The honest but misguided love of his wife,
The distance of his children,
His belief in his work.
Would he have been so devoted?
Would he have learned to love better?
Could he have kept his family close?
Would he have continued working unrewarded?

I wonder
As I look this young man in the photograph,
His whole life ahead of him,
A million choices yet to make,
A million paths to choose from,
If he knew
Where the ones he made,
The ones he chose,
Would lead him.
If he knew he would choke out his last breath
In that cold and sterile place,
Betrayed by a body
That couldn’t respond
To the commands of his still,
Sharp,
Mind.
Would he have done things differently?

I hope that he would have.

Even
if that meant
I never
came
to be.
~

~

~

Author: J.M. Greff
Image: Author’s Own
Editor: Taia Butler
Copy Editor: Catherine Monkman
Social Editor: Yoli Ramazzina