3.27.01 - 4:16 p.m.

am i even here, crumbling under the weight of my body, turning into some sort of oxymoron. i can't breathe. was that me, keening like a banshee, trying to see through raintearsraintears, trying to wipe glass clean, face stinging, drowning out the radio with not me, the inhuman, unnatural sound of it like a bad dream, like something imagined that should never have been born. there is a "maximum volume" in the car, there is a point where the dial will turn no farther, but look here, there is no maximum to this grief that isn't your own, can't be your own because you weren't born with enough pain to account for this, it can't be you, it can't be yours, but where does it come from, where does it start, end, when does it disappear. where can it go.

the worst of it: to know what forever is, to see the lines of days and hours standing like trees or clay soldiers or letters or numbers, those things that hold places without meaning anything, taking up space but filling it with emptiness, oh god, it doesn't make sense, it won't ever make sense, it never makes sense, it never did.

this is when i start speaking in song because i don't even know what to say anymore, i can't feel the thoughts inside my head because there's too much pressure, everything pushing out, but look, it's like you said bret, there is no exit, shit, there is no exit, noexitnoexitnoexit, just panic and fingernails and choking, the feel of your jeans, soaked through with cold rain, coldcoldcoldercoldercolder until finally it's gone and you can't remember because you can't feel.

can you look outside and find something beautiful for me? can you look inside and find something beautiful for me? i found a dollar yesterday when i cleaned my room. it was under a stack of books on my desk. if you found something beautiful for me, would you sell it for a dollar, "a whole dollar"? it doesn't matter. i don't need to own it, i just need to know it's there. here. ?

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