A Brother's Love
by Milton P. Ehrlich
I thought it was a caw of crackles
or the sound of my rusty gate
when it was just a memory
of loved ones singing me
Happy Birthday every year.
When I was a kid,
I made the same wish
at my birthday parties--
or sighting the first star,
or pulling the larger part
of a chicken wing--
and promised not to tell
or it wouldn’t come true.
As I enjoy my 90th birthday,
I still make the same wish
and can’t tell you what it is.
or the sound of my rusty gate
when it was just a memory
of loved ones singing me
Happy Birthday every year.
When I was a kid,
I made the same wish
at my birthday parties--
or sighting the first star,
or pulling the larger part
of a chicken wing--
and promised not to tell
or it wouldn’t come true.
As I enjoy my 90th birthday,
I still make the same wish
and can’t tell you what it is.
Milton P. Ehrlich, Ph.D. is an 89-year-old psychologist and a veteran of the Korean War. He has published poems in Poetry Review, The Antigonish Review, London Grip, Arc Poetry Magazine, Descant Literary Magazine, Wisconsin Review, Red Wheelbarrow, and The New York Times.