Not Always Eye to Eye, but Always Heart to Heart
(*or remote school with my brother)
The dining table no longer goes by its name
Instead halved by a bookshelf ending in flashes of red
A bowl blooms with flowers and fills with the detritus of living
Pencils without lead, myriad pens, and paper galore
Orange peels and biscuit wrappers on either side
My brother and I sit on opposite sides of the table
School reduced to a portion of a window on a screen
Just 3 feet apart
So conversations come and go
Sometimes insults thrown at insults
Not out of annoyance but the need to fill the quiet
Showing each other our little worlds
At lunch, a familiar tap asking for a spoon
The resonant thud of the back door on my daily walks
Telling me the presence of an energetic intruder
Coming to drag me back inside
Filling the space that cabin fever brings
Something I dislike and laugh at simultaneously
The funny thing about remote school
It shrinks and expands your world at the same time
The things that define your existence
May not be momentous or revelatory
But the act of everyday living itself
Has inconveniences and conveniences
But what’s inconvenient in the present
Is what’s memorable later