Fight after fight
Testosterone and rebellion
Then a few hours of peaceful, play-pretend
But I know things
Things you don't know I know
You wait til late to begin again
You see, our wall is paper thin

2 am
You say it's a hunting game
Although I see she's your aim

Boy, you're worth so much more
Yet you've stooped down several levels
Don't listen to the devils

3am
She's not just a friend
I'm waiting to hear you say
"Thee end"

Young man, you've started  digging where I already dug a tunnel
And once it starts caving
There's no way to funnel the regret

4am
don't pick the floor
Your choices they've been so poor

Bud, you've got a huge life ahead of you
This path could ruin it
Don't let her pull you with a bit

I don't want to see you fall to pieces in a heap
Don't cash yourself as cheap
Little brother
Please, get some sleep

On road trips
we would use each other
as pillows

Brother to window
sister to shoulder
brother to shoulder
sister to window
Are we there yet?

I mean,
Are we grown up yet?

Brother to work
sister to rehab
brother to work
sister to school

No matter the pattern
we all appear
leaning on love
and blood

For my brother, it meant everything
to stretch out and press
his face against the pane
of candy stretched crystalline.

To take the path away from father
for me one step away from
step-mother,
baking our dreams into
crumbs we left on the floor.

We’ll trace them back
to the place between
lost and found,
once we’ve fulfilled
our parts,
he’d always tell me.

But he doesn’t understand,
and honestly when does he,
that we’ve been doomed
from the start.

There is no Gretel,
to stoke the logs,
close the grate and latch
no heroine to fit the story’s need
there's only me

So when the witch comes back
she’ll ask
has Hansel truly grown fat?
a little pinch of the skin
an inadvertent test to see
which one of us should win?

It’s always an offering
always a suffering
always a surrender
of what makes me, she
and Hansel truly him

But I don’t mind
filling this role
I know it’s what I was made for
half baked like the crumbs
in a crummy oven
the real Gretel’s long gone
so her understudy will do.
If Mother could bake one daughter
why not try to bake two?

The witch will say it’s time
and ask me to reach back far
to find a warmth she can't see
it’s really not that odd
to hear the words escape me:
"why don't you try,
it's utterly exhausting
always having to hide"
and besides
I always desperately wanted
someone to show me

And I’ll even smile
as the crackle burns for just awhile
Hansel holding my hand
my pigtails askew.

The crumbs, our true
parents,
eaten in the leaves.

As soon as the exams were over, we will be taken over
To a place already familiar to us, as this was ours to be taken over always
The place was like forever before, a two story cubicle
With a small attic attached, the best part of it.

They welcomed us, as usual with some food and sweets
Which made us feel drowsy for the time being
And we will go to bed in the attic, which we will insist
As it was a place full of suspense and thrill

The attic was used as a storage room, with a bedding spread between
The enshrouded variety of storage, which will be our apparatus
In this lab of mystery, sometimes we will find some
Interesting things like, train tickets, military calendars and at other times, great mouth tangling stuff


|AB|

My little sister, is bright.
My little sister is unique.
My little sister is confident.
My little sister is funny,
But she's a bully.

My little sister is a bully,
I can hear it in her words.
She's someone I would hide from,
If I were in the same school as her.

My little sister is a bully,
But she's still changing.
I think the reason she's so blunt,
Is because she's afraid of being like me.

My little sister is afraid,
She saw me crying everyday.
So she shields herself with words.
It makes me feel like I've ruined her.

My little sister is a fighter,
She is thin but strong.
She's someone I want to be.
Hopefully she's still smiling.

My little sister is depressed.
But her smile is still wide.
She knows not to hide.