Empty

A trio of toothbrushes stands together
in the cup on the bathroom counter
before school as I brush my teeth --
one fewer than there was last year on
the date of this very same morning.

Mom makes the family lunch-salad about
twenty-five percent smaller than she used to,
and I set one fewer place on the table.
A vacant chair beside me often makes me lonely,
and the fries never go as fast as they used to.

The midnight oil no longer burns
in the lamp on the desk in your room --
I have the same lamp and desk in my room too.
Remember, Dad bought them at the furniture sale
When you were ten and I was eight.

I hope you are well, my dear brother, and
I know you're surrounded by pens and paper and stamps
At that strange institution where you have gone.
And I know that by the computer there sits a phone,
waiting for you to let your fingers do the walking...

Sometimes, I open the mailbox in the morning and search
in vain for a letter or postcard for me...
Sometimes, when the phone sits quiet in the dead of night,
I'm filled with a strange sort of empty.

                     by Joseph Chong

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