ages of you/green grow the rushes

i wrote you an underwater note
hand signs and ponderous escaping bubbles
and made faces at you across the pool
while your hair swam on it's own like
wayward green wheat.

he was your half-brother,
smoking cigarettes and
killing himself too young in
several other ways, and he
liked to see your hands move
a little desperately; and he liked
to laugh short laughs at your expense/
concern. now he's half-genuine; new
leather strips tugging their lazy weights
down to the bottom of the pool.

it's hard when he suggest you jump off the cliff
together, and offers to kiss you in midair
and you can already taste the blood
on your lips and feel yourself falling
and the smack of the water.

so i write you a note, obtrusive
feminine hand-signals across the
murky eye of water and i say you
can wake up and i'll be glad to hold
your hand or his or both and take
all the blame.