she keeps on passing me...

so i have an old friend who's coming back into town for a bit. we didn't know each other as kids or anything--we don't go that far back--but it feels as though we did. you know that kind of friendship? it's the kind with an uncomfortably pervasive sort of prescience; she will look at me for a long second, and in that time i will feel my ribs open up and give her a plain look at all my most closely held insides.

it is an odd sensation. and a disturbing one, for the way i crave the rare and true communion that comes with it. though i don't much consider what she gets from me, there's the most basic feeling of symbiosis that keeps me from being any other than the most-honest, least-presumptive version of myself. she is not yet here and already my eyes and mouth feel wet.

she'll be in town, and for a while i'll have the delight of her occasional company. will get to remember the way her presence always expands my scope. then she will go and i will be sad--a larger version of the way i'm sad when i run into a years-old school crush.you know, the kind where the fact that she is long forgotten does not prevent a moment of ineffable what-if-only-ness... and in comes the bass; cue the horn; then the words--the ones that tell of old and silly love, of love all the bigger for having never been realized:

all i could do was stare
back as kids we used to kiss
when we played truth or dare
now she's more sophisticated
highly edumacated
not at all over-rated
i think i need a prayer
to get in her boot
and it looks rather dry
i guess a twinkle in her eye
is just a twinkle in her eye.