I recognize us running freely effortlessly
my brother and I alone, one chasing
the other in the overgrown empty lot
next to our childhood Michigan home.

I can see hastening feet blur as we bolt
between skeletal deprived bushes the height
and breadth of children our age—at the time
imagined foes. Unable to discern faces

I instead recollect shared laughter, the dry
salty taste of open-mouthed breathing, breath short
because we were too young to breathe any
deeper. Separated by just under a year, we

hadn’t yet the capacity to fully remember—
images flash only long enough for slivers
of light to appear in the time of idle darkness,
jagged fragments illuminating the measured space

surrounding the frame of a cracked bedroom
door. And, in this dim room, we still sleep.