Wrong-O

a rat-tat-tat, a rat-tat-tat,
where's this house?
you passed it.
(you never gave me gas money.

okay, you did once,
but it still wasn't enough.)

here's to the pieces never fitting,
here's to bending the edges to sleep better at night.
to the wrinkled cardboard, we raise our glasses.

cheers, mistakes. cheers.

jimmy eat world softly whimpers through the speakers, and from your drunken slump against the passenger window you say, 'i love the smashing pumpkins.'
'this isn't the smashing pumpkins.'
'well, i still love them.'

i didn't say it then, but i should have. 'fuck you.'

always count the pieces of a puzzle before you buy it, and if it doesn't feel right when you're coercing the corner pieces to sit in the epicenter of the montage, burn it.

Anthems

my best friend cups my face in her hands, and we cry. my best friend cups my face in her hands and my tears roll over her knuckles. (i'm here instead of home, and no, i don't want to talk about that, either.) she says, you're back, you're finally back, my kendall is finally back.

even if for a moment, i was back.
(don't take hope away from a person; it may be all they have.)

I dug my elbows into my knees and let my face rest in my palms, staring intently at my shoes. I pressed my left foot into the snow then raised it, having it hover while I analyzed the zigzag pattern imprinted in the snow.

We used to do that on the playground all the time. Press a foot in, pull it out slowly, delicately, look at my print. No no, look at mine. Mine is better; my daddy has an office job and can afford me these intricate soles. No no, look at mine: my daddy owns your daddy’s office.

Our own innocence overrode that of the virgin snow; we were branding nature for the sake of our enjoyment.

i have a nasty habit of documenting every single conversation i have and fixing it later on paper.
i have a nasty habit of reinventing my own history.
i make it more distant, more disconnected...or less?


i tell people the story, and they ask, why kendall? why do it at all?
because, i say. because. oh, and,
anyone who doesn't know how good it feels to be needed has obviously never been.


(update: currently unable to register how i feel/felt/will feel, but i'll keep the faith. haven't felt that good in awhile and i would very much like to feel that good sometime again.)
[park that car // drop that phone // sleep on the floor // dream about me]

Subterfuge

found some old poems; found some old memories; found someone to read them.
(some are newer than others.)
(the poems, i mean.)

the snow:
driving no longer procures any sort of rapture, driving becomes a task.
the snow:
attire must be planned in advance, getting dressed becomes a task.
the snow:
i take it i won't be seeing you anymore?
(breathing becomes a task.)

she chopped up a centipede in her basement.
she put the pieces in a ziploc bag and we watched them wiggle.
later that day, i chopped up an earwig with a sega cartridge.
the pieces didn't move.
now that i think about it, that's probably where all of this began.

let's get reacquainted.
i learned a new word, and it sounds like ...
i digress.

at the end of the day, i need to know that you're thinking about me.
that's not really a question you can or should evade; yes, no, never have, never will?
(regardless, i'm calling affirmative. i need that.)

meander, depart.
if i could focus on much of anything,
i'd be more of a something.