For BJ: My Brother (Died 01/03/03) by Jean Jones Our lives lie scattered like so much dust grains of sand thrown against a person's face at a windy seashore each pebble of sand a person's life Our lives thrown like dust from the rear tire of a passing car. . . One minute we are alive the next dead our whole lives a series of photographs and what do we leave behind when we go? Old memories gone to dissipate in the moldering remains of an abandoned cemetery. . My brother lies dead from AIDS in a North Carolina prison I cannot afford to bury him and my other brother will not help pay for a funeral so my brother will be disposed by the state in a crematoria or used as a practice body for training doctors to practice their sutures . . . My father's ashes lie buried in a military cemetery near Camp Lejune, North Carolina and what is his legacy? My memories, his other children's memories, some yellowing slides, several World War II campaign medals, a plaque from the American Legion, and a series of photographs. . I have my brother's possessions from the prison: They include sticks of gum and a pair of tennis shoes. After my father's funeral, I received enough money from his insurance to buy myself a pair of tennis shoes. My father's trailer park was paved over to build a pawnshop, his motel in Maryland replaced by a parking lot by the new owner and my mother's house, repossessed and she now stays in a nursing home What are we? Where are we going? What is our legacy? Where will we end our lives? Will we die in a nursing home of renal failure? Will we die in a hospital bed alone except for the prison guard sent to keep guard over us? All we are, all we really are, and all we ever will be are the memories we leave behind: My brother getting me drunk legally on my 18th birthday (when it was legal to drink beer at 18), him wrestling me and beating me then, his strange presents, and his good but vainglorious intentions: Too much desire but not enough common sense, more dreams than a workable plan: I miss you, BJ for you remind me of what we all already should know: Our lives are scattered around us like so many photographs, one blink and in a second, we're gone- Like so many leaves of grass thrown and kicked up by a pair of tennis shoes each piece of dust a complete life       © 2007 Jean Jones