and i promised. i try not to go back on my promises.

women are beautiful. all women. im just saying, thats all.

"im overwhelmed"

"anything i can do to help?"

"no."

"if there ever is anything, you tell me alright."

"right."

and i wish she would use that.

i know why she doesnt, why she wont. shes trying to let me be free. shes trying not to weigh on me, what with everything she knows is weighing on me.

hell, she even told me the other day i give myself too damn much.

but damn. damn damn damn. what did i do to lead her to believe she was an unwanted weight?

she fits on me like a jacket. the pockets might get full, might pull on my shoulders slightly, but if it was removed, taken off, i'd be exposed, i'd be off balance, i'd feel... not myself.

i wait. i wait and wait and wait. and ill keep on waiting, because its her.

because its me.

listen to the peppy rhythm of the finger snapping behind you, below the whispering of its a kind of magic.

a kind of magic.

the strings flow in and out and twine and you look at my clumsiness and ask laughingly youre not very good with knots are you.

and the strings flow in and out and amazingly my fingers, small as they are, work the knots out.

i wonder who the person was who looked at shoes and said hey, this is what tied laces should look like. and how they got others to follow that.

im compact for a reason. it gives me a bigger choice of escapable routes. ive got speed, sure, but not enough you couldnt catch me.

youve just got to make sure i dont have a loophole.

knots.

its a magicial kind of thing.