Joey’s frozen in time at 28.
He’ll always be a hippie wearing silver rings and belt buckles
never become more conservative, less idealistic
always be a resident in UCLA medical school
never open his practice
always be riding his horse Spartacus in the California canyons.
The wind will always whip his long black hair
which will never recede, turn gray.
He’ll always be long and lean
no paunch on him
no lines on his face
no scars he can’t bear

He’ll always be my idolized, idealized big brother
larger than life
full of it.
He’ll always cut a striking figure
women will always turn around to get another look at him
as we stride down Fifth Avenue.
He’ll always receive their tributes
he never could get enough of them

He’ll always be a Vietnam War protester
organizing a national movement of physicians and surgeons against the war
magazine clippings about his activities that he sent us piling up.
But the war will never be over for him.
He died mysteriously
a suicide note found on him
a hypodermic needle by his side in the desert which he loved.
The note talked about becoming one with the universe
being at peace
that it was no one’s fault
no one should take on blame

But it also said he wasn’t able to truly love
which never added up to me.
He was the embodiment of love of life and
had a girlfriend who loved him totally
but he couldn’t settle for one
always had to be free, trumpeted its virtues.

My father never told my mother it was suicide
and we all became accomplices to that secret
until years later she stumbled on the note my father had hidden in his bureau.
My sister, brother and I seldom talked to my parents about Joey’s death.
All this shrouding in secrecy
helped keep him sealed in time.
He never could grow up

Everyone I knew was awed by his boldness, life force, striking good looks.
The rest of us in the family never could live up to him
I guess he couldn’t live up to himself either
maybe it was too big a mantle to wear, got too heavy
maybe he dropped too much acid
maybe his role as an anti-war activist caught up to him in murderous ways

Maybe the car accident four years earlier of which he was the lone survivor
and five people died
came to haunt him.
He was cocooned in a sleeping bag and emerged from the car with just bruises.
Ostensibly

I found out about his death as I was driving out west
just after Christmas 1971
just before the new year
after I called him to see if we could meet up somewhere.
Before we were able to do it.
Maybe he’d become immortal to me after that car accident
so that when I was first told of his death I kept saying
“No you got it wrong,
this is Joey we’re talking about here
he’s fine, you’ll see.”
I kept this up for so long– minutes, maybe even hours–
I don’t know now if I truly thought he was magic
or my brain denied what didn’t fit.

Maybe he thought he was immortal too
or conceived of a different life stream as he was big into Buddhism.
He was always so dramatic
maybe this was just his final flourish, the grand finale.

He died before he got that MD in Psychiatry
before he could play out his promise
before he could see mine as a teacher and a writer
before I could really know him
since I had gone off to college and he to medical school and the gap of nine years was so large, then.
Before I learned how to tune in to weak signals
hear what’s not talked about
swim beneath the surface.

It took my mom ten years until she could look at a photograph of him
and it was a little snippet of a thing
not much bigger than a thumbnail.
She put it by her bed
and when presented by my father with a larger framed version
she turned away and said
Don’t you know I can’t look at one that size?
It took several more years
until larger photos came out of hiding
and put out on the shelves with the rest of us

He died after he sorted through his life and came up short
before any of us who loved him could help
before I got to know him as an adult
husband or father, or perpetual free-wheeling spirit.
Before he ever became flawed to me, became real
after I learned to magnify him
before I could get him down to scale
before he became my peer.
Before I ever started calling him Joe, or Joel.
He’ll always be Joey.