I didn’t mean to write about you (5/31/21)

After Richard Siken

Last Saturday I was thinking about you

and feeling stupid (as I do everyday),

and I couldn’t stop dreaming about it:

How we started, how I don’t want there

to be an end.

Let’s not put a number to this. Let’s not count—

just let the moon pass by us.

We can wait for its fullness together.

I mean, I’m a romantic and you know it.

I’m just entertaining the thought:

How we’d shape in bed, breakfast the morning afterwards:

Black tea, eggs, something else American.

I’d put cheese on it and you’d laugh or cry

Or maybe both. I’d eat it anyway.

Picture this: Winter on Nassau Street: holding

the warmth between our bodies

like a flower, and of course it’d be

first snowfall and I’d tell you—

I’m sorry, I get ahead of myself.

I didn’t mean to write a love poem or

to write about you at all,

But when I dream it’s always about you:

these small, lovely little futures. Let’s warm them

in our palms until they rise to the sky

we can smoke them afterwards, let them

breathe, fly, come back again.

In August, it will be spring.

I mean, that’s when we’ll bloom.

In my world everything is a metaphor for us:

the sweetness of what I’ve found within you:

life feels special.

Coffee and strawberries in the kitchen,

walking the dog. Goodnight,

goodmorning. Waiting, waking,

and I swear I didn’t mean to write a love poem today,

didn’t mean to write about you at all.

I wanted to write like Richard Siken: something short,

something glamorous and sparkly like Scheherazade,

But what I have is messy—what we are is messy—messy

but I find peace in it; you center me,

I mean, I wanted to write about today

But I wrote about you. And it feels good.

Here. This little space in my journal,

Have it.

It’s the most I can give and my heart. Yes,

Sometimes I get scared, I hide, but somehow

you find me;

Maybe this is right, you feel right. It scares me.

Every other love poem I wrote: intentional, crafted,

deliberate, creatively hesitant. Well,

I’m writing this and I’m biting the insides

of my cheek, (I’m nervous),

it feels easy, you make me want

to write like Richard Siken in the first place:

breathless, flustered, red, run-ons,

no hesitation.

All this space between us, I’ll close it with words—god,

you make me want to write love poems about you,

go to bed whispering in my sleep, smiling.

It’s daylight. Goodmorning. I’m still smiling.