mary and max.

Dear Mary,

Please find enclosed my entire Noblet collection as a sign that I forgive you. When I received your book, the emotions inside my brain felt like they were in a tumble dryer, smashing into each other.

The hurt felt like when I accidentally stapled my lips together.

The reason I forgive you is because you are not perfect. You are imperfect, and so am l. All humans are imperfect, even the man outside my apartment who litters.

When I was young, I wanted to be anybody but myself. Dr Bernard Hazelhof said if I was on a desert island then I would have to get used to my own company, just me and the coconuts. He said I would have to accept myself, my warts and all, and that we don't get to choose our warts. They are a part of us and we have to live with them.

We can, however, choose our friends and I am glad I have chosen you.

Dr Bernard Hazelhof also said that everyone's lives are like a very long sidewalk. Some are well paved. Others, like mine, have cracks, banana skins and cigarette butts. Your sidewalk is like mine but probably not as many cracks. Hopefully, one day our sidewalks will meet and we can share a can of condensed milk.

You are my best friend.

You are my only friend.

Your American penpal,

Max Jerry Horowitz.

*

Max had died peacefully that morning,

after finishing his final can of condensed milk.

He smelt like liquorice and old books, Mary thought to herself,

as tears rolled from her eyes, the colour of muddy puddles.

spotless mind.

Joely?

Yeah, Tangerine?

Am l ugly?

I-ıh.

When l was a kid l thought l was. Can't believe l'm crying already. Sometimes l think people don't understand how lonely it is to be a kid. Like you don't matter. So, l'm eight, and l have these toys, these dolls. My favorite is this ugly girl doll who l call Clementine. And l keep yelling at her, "You can't be ugly. Be pretty." lt's weird. Like if l can transform her, l would magically change, too.

You're pretty.

Joely, don't ever leave me.

You're pretty. You're pretty. Pretty.

*

Mierzwiak

Please let me keep this memory

Just this one

the hours.

Dearest,

I feel certain, that I'm going mad again. I think we can't go through another of these terrible times, and I shan't recover this time. I begin to hear voices and can't concentrate. So I'm doing what seems the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness. You have been in every way all that anyone could be. I know that I'm spoiling your life and without me you could work, and you will. I know. You see I can't even write this properly.

What I want to say is that I owe all the happiness of my life to you. You have been entirely patient with me and incredibly good. Everything is gone for me, but the certainty of your goodness. I can't go on spoiling your life any longer.

I don't think two people could have been happier than we have been.

Virginia

*

To look life in the face, always.

To look life in the face

and to know it... for what it is.

At last to know it, to love it... for what it is.

And then to put it away, Leonard.

Always the years between us.

Always the years.

Always the love.

Always the hours.

the fisher king.

You ever read Nietzsche?

Nietzsche says, there are two kinds of people in the world.

People who are destined for greatness,

like Walt Disney and Hitler,

and then there's the rest of us.

He called us "the bungled and the botched."

We get teased. We sometimes get close to greatness,

but we never get there.

We're the expendable masses.

We get pushed in front of trains, take poison aspirin.

You want to hear the new title of my biography, my little Italian friend?

"It Was No Fuckin' Picnic."

You like it?

Il Nova Esta Fuckin' Picnic-O.

You're a good kid. You just say "No" to drugs.

...

You ever get the feeling sometimes

that you're being punished for your sins?

...

bir fincan kahve aşkına mı hep bu gitmeler?

o adam

bob dylan

o film

i'm not there

o altyazı

burada

"şimdi dikiliyorum yolda, bir başıma.

o örtülü, çıplak mevsimlerin her birinde,

gözlerim düşüyor onlarca manzaraya.

bakıyorum ona.

işitiyorum, görüyorum, hissediyorum ve ciğerlerime çekiyorum onu.

içime alıyorum.

tenimdeki gözeneklere dolduruyorum.

bir esinti gözlerimin arasında,

bal taşıyor kovanıma."