I don't remember much of you. We were never friends, I don't know if we ever had a class together (maybe PE), and I'm not sure if we even ever spoke (maybe a few words... I'd like to hope so.) I remember you were well-liked by many. I remember thinking you were cute, and maybe even having a little crush from afar.
I remember your laugh, ever-so slightly.

I don't know if I remember your voice.
I don't remember any times with you, good or bad (though I think we were both at Rattlesnake on senior skip day). I remember positive feelings toward you for the most part, though I was aware that we we're very different. We might not have gotten along if extended interaction had occurred. We were in high school...
I remember that we were in different friend groups,
and I remember that we probably had different beliefs.

...I don't remember why that was important.


It's painful, and maybe wrong, but I try to imagine what it was like when you were dying. Or even what it was like to be in a situation where you it was likely to die any given day. Did it feel honorable to die over there? Did you know it was going to happen? Maybe it wasn't like anything. Maybe it was instant. But your friends had been killed just days before. Did you know it was coming? How much did you think about it? Was it painful? Was it peaceful? Did you have any regrets?



How many people had you killed?
I'm... so sorry, but I can't keep that question inside me anymore.
This is the nature of war.
And I can't be proud of it.


I hate to compare high school to war, but think of what came between us:
"We had different beliefs"

different values
different things that we would die for.
are they so different?
freedom? equality? peace?
and we believe and we love and we fight to defend what we love.
and we fight
and we FIGHT
and we fight wars

warrrrrrrrrrrrr
fucking fuckin fucking WAR
FUCK

its all fucking violence.
a fuckin fistfight
in the hall, with the gray carpet and the red lines.
and the lines that we stand behind. (i thought we were all on the same side).

we were just trying to survive that place.
we're just trying to give the world a better face!
but its bleeding on the floor. its bleeding on the carpet
stained until they change it,
on the fuckin desert sand,
soaked until they rearrange it
and it will blow away with the wind.
it will fucking blow away!

no, it will fucking stay in the fabric cross sections of gray.
the blood bleeds across the lines from either side,
and maybe someday
there will be enough sacrifice.

yea
we're waiting for a time when the blood blends the gray with crimson,
and we can remember no line at all.