You have been in my mind
A very long time
I wonder how long it takes
For a persistent, returning thought
To gain permanence
Some part of me, an echo of some part of you
Even if one way, even if you have no idea, even if I am one of many
There’s something lovely about how I feel about you
As if I alone can see the greater things that make you
As if I had power to reflect you out into the world
Give substance to the emotion of being enthralled
A smile you cannot describe, a neck as delicate as a flower stem
From those secret recesses, an unfurling of more
I’ll never share all I see, when you aren’t aware of being observed, thinking yourself invisible
Or how many times you make me wince
Just imagining
How it would be if you returned
Even a tenth
Even a fifth of what I feel
If you could see me and long to
Wipe that errant strand from my brow
Take my hands in yours until they warmed
Cold hands, warm heart
Your mittens clammy with frost and body heat, you stand apart needing nothing, least of all me
In my imagination, our roles reverse
It is your chest that swells
In my proximity
Your blood rushes to your cheeks
When I look up into your caramel eyes
Eyes that remind me of sunlight
Poured through honey
Disapproving lips I want to touch with my own
It physically hurts
To think of you like cross hatches made with sharp knife on skin once able to be without
I could draw out my longing to lay beside you
Trace lines I am unfamiliar with until I know them as destinations
I thrive when you enter my heart and set it alight
Is it ever too late? Is it ever no longer necessary?
To raise you above them all
To need to follow you where you go
In the silence of time, you blaze
With my ever sustaining regard
Never as simple as; just something about her (although there is JUST SOME THING ABOUT YOU)
Not as easy as; do not take a chance
Hesitation has thrown herself away in fits
Made this the hour, I do something
To show what I always felt
Watching you then and now
Years in-between, no time, no space
Desire will be the last to survive
The heart is certain
Even as dreams may doubt their endings
We swim, eyes fastened on shoreline
The outline of you emerging, full and complete
Against ever changing background, your cruelty
Just a defense, used forever
Until there is no need.