what i need versus what i get.

life isn't so life-like, and don't you destroy this day.

"just like a soldier, these are my spoils of war."

red animal war blaring, i drive faster than i should, angry at the soft metal holding me together and the people who disappoint rather than change. i'm smoking my last cigarette and thinking of you. how you would have made this all better, or at least put the thought in my head that someone still respected me. how you would have smiled and said, "come home to me, baby. we still got us." how you would have looked at my face, put your chin on my head, and taken my whole into your arms ... saying ... you don't need a friend like that.

but now, i just drive faster, not caring where my ash lands.

i need something more, but i get empty hands.

i'm begging for you to help me, i'm pleading with the car stereo to play me something i know, i'm crying and i can't see the road. i can hear small bits of your voice, but i don't follow through on listening.

i get no apologies. my thin skin of patience has been worn straight through. i don't get any peace. i get what's considered probably too much time alone. it's not even the time or place for reconciliation, and so i keep on driving until i don't know my way around ... until the streets blend into each other, and i'm somewhere other than where i'm supposed to be. it's not enough that i get small consolations and rebuilt worlds.