you, who at first made me feel different,

and yet at once very much the same:

my heart leapt, and my stomach twisted

around every syllable of your name.

 

i don’t think i have ever tried so desperately hard

to feel okay and to not try to grieve this,

but promise me, darling: if you break my heart,

stay to at least help pick up the pieces.

 

but i’ve found that i am not scared anymore,

or i’m learning, at least; i am trying.

i’ve learned not everyone that tells me they love me

will send me home bruised, bloody, and crying.

 

i think i love you, for you’ve stars in your eyes

(though you do try so hard to deny it);

for you see the future where i see long stretches

of fear and unknowns and moon dust.

 

i think i love you, for your fingers are long

and you tuck in your feet when you’re drawing;

for you know that you can still call yourself strong

when you call me in your days of mourning.

 

i think i’m in love with you, and i don’t know why,

but it’s beginning to not really scare me.

all of my novels, my old fairytales

could not have begun to prepare me.

 

i’m sorry i couldn’t tell you that i loved you too

when you told me the first time, so nervous.

i was unsure, and i don’t want to tell you untruths;

i could have lied, but you didn’t deserve it.

 

but it’s no untruth now, or i don’t think it is;

i can at last begin to call this love mine.

and to think! to think, that i was so scared

of being in love for the first time.