To you,

My wish to feel your presence again gives me great delight and I long to be enveloped in your embrace.  I too, feel the minutes pass on until the day has died and your face is only a memory.  But our love remains crystalline, and the stars in your eyes

 (damn clichés… I know how you hate those)

reminded me how beautiful love is.

I’ve learned from you why owls always are asking questions. Such a habit that is inquiry intensifies with age, you told me, as you brushed my hair behind my ear and grinned when my fingers left charcoal marks on your hands.

You taught me why the sea is blue and how desperate the sky was since its heart continues to beat even when its delirious with pain and  its tears fall every so often, creating a curtain around us as we walk in the street and dare to dance in the remains of the sky’s depression. You had twirled the matches in your fingers but never possessed the heart to light them, since you always saw her doing it behind the garage and the curls of smoke that drifted into the sky were nothing compared to that of a dragon.

 The smell was comfort, you must have always liked that burn, too, I suppose.

Your smile is my favorite piece of you.  Sure you’re uncomfortable with your true smile but you have let me see it.  It’s quite beautiful.

 I remark on the beauty more when your dimples are exposed but your mouth remains sealed.  

Like a closed blossom, I know what’s behind those petals. That smile cracks the plaster mold you’ve sculpted and the heart inside learns its rhythm again.

 For so long you kept your love in chains and it was barefaced: mine wasn’t.  I’ve never uttered that word to someone who could control me like this.

  A prisoner of some sort, but aren’t you mine as well?

 I had been so reluctant to feel another’s fingers against my cheek and to close my eyes for reasons other than sleep. You had taught me that dandelions continue to bloom even when they grow between the cracks.  That the moon and sun have to be apart in order to nurture the night, and that together we make a whole.

When I had changed countless times you had said that stripes only accentuate the hills and valleys of the human body.   Said that the hills should not be subject to squinted noses and crinkled eyes upturned in disgust. Seeing that those noses and eyes belonging only to those who do not deserve to have my presence.

You were always so certain.  You would feel while others would only hear and what you tasted I had only seen.  The berries were tart because they were picked too early and their skin felt like the way rain hit my car window, you said as you sniffed their purple skins.

No, no, the berries were tart because of the sourness that touched my tongue when I bit into them, I had said.  You grinned and you reminded me that each time the earth laughs a flower blooms and that fish have gills because lungs are such a hassle.

  I mentioned the lungfish but you kissed my nose and whispered

“It’s ironic isn’t it?”

You took my hands and told me that my voice smelled like Sunday, crisp edges yet rounded corners reeking of burnt syrup.

I told you that your voice sounded like gravel but could calm a storm. I said that your voice was music and life beating in a broken chest but you only laughed.

We are only filled with water because of our desire to be mermaids and our wings had shrunken into our backs since we had spent so much time wishing to fly when we had never recognized our ability to do so.  I didn’t mind when you ran your fingers through my hair and picked out the knots because you told me that nobody was perfect.

 The bruises do fade, remember that.

When we were standing at the altar, you had said that our vows came from the heart as well as the hands.    When you kissed me, I felt the stars and the breaths and trees and the grass and the rain as I said I love you because to me, you were my whole world and there was nothing I wanted more than to simply be with you.

My love for you is undefinable and I thank you for existing.  For, without your existence, my eyes would not see the science of the stars and my lips not taste the music.

               Forever Yours,

                               Me