The value of conflict

[raum]

i watch him smile as he hits me once cause I need him to get close enough to just use his momentum to put him on the wall, and as he hits - a palm strike to his right lung under his punch to expel the air from his lungs as his left hits the wall... and his arm still out - he comes full contact as I avoid breaking him off badly by turning my hand to glance the floating ribs instead of cracking a fixed one...

and youngblood um,..

*drops like he took a hit of nitrous and wakes up with a headache and that same stupid grin till his mom knocks it off his face.*

his brother and me always watched each other closely but he saw his brother come at me from off their porch across the street. and i told him "your brother wll never be a man you want at your side if you fight his fights for him, after he just got his ass kicked. The man need revenge, let him come for it."

they tried to jump my friend on the bus, but he was not aggressive and fortunately for him it was church night so the bus was full of grown folk. He's one of my best friends in cali, but he couldn't survive a fight head-on. He's the kind of man who would rather take a flurry of punches than throw one of his own. As a result he has this knack of avoiding fights. Not a coward, just no taste for violence.

if only it were that simple for all of us...