Keyboard Overheated, Brain Overworked
Stranger,
These thoughts have been bugging me for days,
arrays of worries and unanswered questions,
expressions I need to exclaim,
the space is to blame.
I miss living on your street beating our feet against the concrete
to launch our brand new boards to the skatepark.
I remember moments I tried to surpass you while you landed striking tricks.
I still have scars from the falls that left me with knicks.
Do you still have yours?
The wound from your skin breaking
when we broke into the school at night
and broke for the ground
when we saw the cops breaking the speed limit
to get over the hill that we'd run up weekly,
bleekly reaching the half-way point on our summer runs.
Cross country was never fun,
I just joined for the friends.
Sorry if the point was missed.
Trees stopped blurring as I pumped my fist,
falling over when my legs wouldn't persist,
I would insist I was fine but really I crossed the line
and wished I didn't exist.
The fault was mine and the running was torture,
I could have chose this sport or
another, but you were a runner
and I wanted some company, that was the jist.
This letter is something off my checklist.
It's taken more effort to forge these words
than all twelve years of school working towards
the acceptance from college I spent months frettitng over.
Now the search is over and the gauntlet done,
our friendship over and the excitement run.
What happened to the nights I could bombard you with news,
white headlights radiating our clothes as we rose to the hood
of my car and talked like we'd never met?
Now it feels like we really haven't,
but there hasn't been one word spoken since October.
Why won't you come over?
I'm furious you let it get like this,
the music I miss
belting with windows down and faces up at the summer sky.
We'd do the same,
lying still as the constellations fixed in position,
exit following exhibition
of shooting stars over the tennis court
we decided to lie in
(no cause or reason).
No better times than trips we would squeeze in
to the gas station,
splurging 2 dollars to sate our greed,
an over-priced water bottle we didn't need.
As kings in our palace,
we'd pass the Fiji Water® chalice,
surveying our heat simmered street
frum rusted steel seats
on a dusty, cracked porch.
A trip down memory lane is the last event on my mind.
I guess by writing this letter there was something I'd hope to find.
Do you still skate? Still run?
Just make your response kind.
So long I've kept these notions confined
hoping they're something you can get behind.
Behind this desk, I've kept myself confined.
Some might say I've been on a grind,
typing far too long.
It's not a hard task, just put in some effort.
A keyboard and some strokes,
a notebook and a pen,
a pencil and the back of a receipt.
I don't care. Talk to me.
The prize of my quest isn't you.
It's your attention.
Write me,
Your Friend