I’ll trade 10 thousand joys to replace the
deeper, familiar regrets:

 
Take how I didn’t change my life to spend
a couple years more with my parents. 
Take how long I stayed without the
feeling of home in two or
three roommate situations. 
 
I’ll offer 100 thousand mistakes
for my greater loss:
 
Take the times I did or didn’t get my tires
rotated, 
my hair cut, my plants watered.
 
Inconveniences are easy:
We can wrap a bloody toe in a band aid.
We can call the pizza place and get
a $5 credit for the fresh basil they forgot. 
 
Ex-roommates are the past’s concern. 
Nothing too impactful will change over
tires. 
Nothing’s uprooted over my hair cut. 
 
Dear Dad described my regret
as water under the bridge. 
 
Now could we consider: a brother’s silence?
 
No balance book is thrown off
when we do not hang on to siblings. 
 
No bargain exchange matches 
the wall-to-wall sorrow
of your biological peer
pulling the rug of promises
out from under you. 
 
We’re stuck at my one-way messages.
He won’t accept or refuse my amends,
could not update me on his health scare.
 
No. No? No.
No. No.
I might miss him.
Maybe often as
I miss watering day. 
No one who loves me 
can see my houseplants, anyway.