10: Tears of the Kingdom (Nintendo)

i don’t own a Switch and

          (some of us grew up on off-brand coupons

          and never grew out of them even as our

          wallets have grown            wider

          so content ourselves with what falls cheaply

          into our ginger mitts

          the way my cat prefers

          bottle caps and castoff cough drop

          to the fancy string toys on offer)

          (the day my brother and i got an N64 is an etching

          worn softer than any Christmas in my mind)

          (the first time i held an Xbox controller was in the

          back of your dad’s house behind the oscar fish

          my fingers straining just to keep the thing in my grip)

you

for one are so far away that the hallways and the walls between us

have grown          so much          wider

it’s bridges and routes and cities i must surmount

just to sit and watch you

(i remember how you hid the disc when i inched too close to catching you up, and i knew you so completely, so everything yet could comprehend you about as well as i could when we were seven and you hurt my feelings for the day) (and another time when you watched me playing though i don’t even remember if you backseat drove the whole ordeal or were hone-focus quiet as i was until the boss was dead, just that you huddled over the screen and my hands the way my own eyes did) (or when we very small, glitter-eyed at songs and swords and shiny rocks)

on a couch where your husband nervously suggests i must

be bored

come all this way to do nothing

come on now how can you say that this is nothing?