so here’s one for all the ones who are like me
here’s one for all the ones who count themselves as more than one, and everyone else less than. 
here’s one to all the ones who can’t find something to believe in,
walk. 

plain and simple, i won’t spell it out for you any clearer,
take all of the logistical facts about the nonsensical things that you’ve been unnecessarily keeping track of, 
spending countable minutes wrapping your head around,
spending quick seconds of sighs, 
eye rolls,
scoffs,
here’s to the better-than’s and the jeopordy-aristotles who have fucked themselves in the mind with useless information so they can go above and beyond fiction to a heightened sense of reality in which the good guy loses, the bad guy will always be unfulfilled, and the dreamers fall flat on their ass when confronted with the reality of bills and moral compasses. 

walk.

here’s one to myself, from start to finish, after finding the end to my useless self-deprivation of dreaming and interest,
after chasing ideas in circles in my head until mentally healthy thought patterns are just one more fallacy that I have to apply to the context of the universe that i’ve picked up over brief online conversations and books about losing the things you love,
after tricking myself into being mentally unstable just to realize that that might not actually be a mentally stable thing to do, 
after pointing out the black and the white in the most colorful story that has ever been and ever will be,
after staring at the sadness that is reality and envying the daft and ignorant for their joy from nothing, 
walk.

forget about the things that hurt long enough to care for them,
forget about the fact that people can’t fly just so you can still pretend sometimes,
forget about the bits of logic that take you to the end of your life where the only option is that you die alone, cold, and broken,
find something to love, sometimes no matter the cost,
believe in it,
and then walk. 

i hope, at some point, in my life or past it, someone finds some solace in what i write. 

whether it be in consent to the ideas i propose, or vehement hate from the bottom of the soul. 

I’ve come to find that the idea that you can achieve anything you want as long you try hard enough is absolute bullshit. Not only that, but it is also somehow both simultaneously and continuously taught by almost everyone as an absolute truth, that there is actually a possible way to literally achieve any goal you set for yourself as long as you have the will and strength and effort behind it. I think a more accurate adage would be that most people who can make such sweeping generalizations about hope haven’t had to work for much in their life (or rather, haven’t had much to work for), and I find that distressful for everyone involved. Both for the owner who will end his life at the cut of the dollar because he doesn’t quite know endurance like the rest of us, and for the lover who is cursed to the insanity of the chase after, bid to die, cold and alone, because he thought anything else would be settling for less. 

This is just another hopeless story. 

breathe a lot.
i’ve noticed people who breathe are a lot happier than people who don’t.
don’t pay attention. people who pay the least amount of attention have the least amount of worries.
smile all the time. that’s kind of like being happy.
tell everyone you’re okay when they ask why you’re crying.
ask them how they are doing to change the subject.

try not to cry. 

don’t read any books. they inspire envy. 
don’t think about unfortunate people. and when you do, just give something you can spare until you feel better. 
don’t brush your teeth some nights. sleep on the other side of the bed some nights. have an extra glass of orange juice, on me. it’s okay to live a little sometimes.
read the newspaper or watch the news. sometimes you have to know the facts. 
buy some jogging pants in case you need to impress someone.  

don’t focus on anything, just in case you see something you won’t like.
don’t try too hard at anything, just in case you fail.  

on second thought, try not to breathe as much.
i’ve noticed people who don’t breathe are a lot happier than people who do.

it’s a long process.
it feels like a lot of walking. in between areas, i mean. even after arriving, it still seems like i’m just waking. 

they keep us safe, they say.
i don’t feel very safe.

i think it has been more days than i’d like to remember. 
but i can’t remember. which i think i’m okay with.

and then there’s that distress you recollect on the tips of your fingers. like a long drawl of breath, the soreness seeps up your veins until inevitably settling just behind your eyes - a constant reminder of my ineptitude, a notice of a seemingly uncontrollable inadvertence, a subtle tick to tell me that all mistakes have not yet been made.

like relief, only the resolve isn’t quite as satisfying when you know it’s not quite over yet. 

i feel like a shop that has been trying to close for the night, for years. 

a lot of memories don’t really have any reason. and that confuses me sometimes. 
I can recall ages ago looking down at a linoleum kitchen floor that was styled like brick and I told my grandma that I liked her bricks and she laughed and told me it wasn’t real and that it was just pretend. there are probably month expanses of my life that are blank and that i cannot recall at all, but for some reason, that little minute session of my life has managed to become some high-priority memory of my childhood, and I have no idea why. 

I wonder sometimes if that’s when i first learned to lie. or when i first learned how easy it was to lie. I don’t think the idea was ever as tangible as it was that day. and maybe that’s why I remember it so perfectly clear. I was young. I don’t remember how young. but young. and all I can remember thinking is, “Why would people want this? Why would people want to be tricked?” and so I thought about that for a few months and finally came up with a reasonable enough answer that I think i started to live by.

Reality isn’t always a necessity. 
and humanity is willing to settle for a lot less. 

there is a glorified whore in the corner of my mind and i’d like to get to know her but i don’t think she’s worth my time. she tells me things about her anyways and i don’t think she tells it right. her life story, her own creation - but it’s missing vital organs and those holes and gaps and lapses of time are obvious and impossible to follow. she reports her character to me like a list of things to do and when she finally finishes i feel like i’ve mastered the art of not knowing what to say. so i speak back awkwardly, jab at her unconsciously with my blank words and drawn out expressions and so this is conversation but i don’t think we’re doing it right. i’m no expert but there seems to be some discrepancy in the transmission of what we’re both trying to relay. “You’re built for so much more,” is what i’d like to say. “Beauty on beauty on beauty and the complexity of your genetic disposition known as humanity is so far beyond anything that could ever be taken advantage of, but instead you just give yourself away.” “I’m not accurately conveyed,” is what she’d like to say. “There are a million circumstances in play that form the entirety of my selfishness and not one of them is to blame. An idea stole my virginity and gave itself away and if I ever had the choice, I sure as hell missed it.” Well we’re just the same. Millions of choices and influences and problems and issues and cures and we are what happens to us and that’s okay. but the bride has had the wrong things happen to her and that’s not. so maybe i’d like to think that the bride has been lost so maybe i can find her again another day and hope to god that i don’t ever have to become reacquaintanced with that former influence that drugged my life with complacency and selfishness. and hope to god i don’t ever have to find anything similar to that experience.  

and it dripped down the side of his forearm, tickling his soft skin. 
”My granddad lived a long life. Pent up on his own. He was alone a long time.”
Long drawls of empty space developed between the dead air in the room and the walls holding it in. 
“I think he had a lot of adventures. Quiet ones. On his own. He probably saved people. He probably killed people.”
Leaning back on his heels, and leaning back forward onto his toes.
“He ran from Nazi’s I think. He flew planes for the US after that. I never asked him enough questions. I don’t think anyone did. Sometimes I wonder if it’s hereditary, the silent adventures.”
It was like a soft whisper held muted. Sustained. It was like the quietest noise was about to break but was held back instead.  
“He lived alone with one of his daughters. They hated each other. I don’t mean that lightly.”
and when the first drop hit the apex of his finger, it pulled on his body like a weight dragging him down in thick, murky waters.
“So he lived a brilliant life, and died alone. and his daughter died a few months later, alone. I try not to think about it mostly.”
and it never fell. It held onto his hand like a small child grasping her father. It held onto him and did not let go. and after death came, and skin decay, the bone lay, with crimson stain. 
“He could sing. He could sing really well.”
The dormant body lay, innocent and gray. 
“That’s why I did it. If that makes sense.”

we all feel the way we feel about things for a reason