stay where you are and then leave

Unrequited (adj.): not returned or reciprocated

Love (n.): a profoundly tender, passionate affection, often mingled with sexual desire, for another person

Many years ago, I gave a girl I loved a book for her birthday; and since I loved her, I couldn’t just give her any ordinary book. Well, the book was ordinary enough, but I felt that I must imbue it with some special quality. Since I didn’t know any spells or incantations at the time, I settled on something a bit less fantastic.

I started on the first page of the book and circled a word, then I continued farther down the page and circled another. Turning the first page, my eyes skimmed the second as I searched for more words to circle. Word by word, I began piecing together a poem for this girl I loved, hidden in plain sight. I got to around the 20th page before I was content with my conglomeration of appropriated words and phrases.

I gave her the book and waited for days, then weeks, then months for a text or call or facetime. I don’t know what I expected. I was an optimistic youth, fully stuffed with fantasies of Romance yet admittedly stuck with the realities of unrequited love. No message of rapturous love was ever received. We’ve talked here and there since I gifted her that book. We even kissed late one night, but she’s never brought up my poem hiding in plain sight. I’m not sure if she even read the book. No matter if she has or hasn’t, it doesn’t change the fact that I loved her deeply and “wrote” this poem for her:

Every passing day

I know we could make

a fresh start,

despite saying

we’re finished. 

I can’t help but remember

the old day or years,

but it was possibly a dream.

I burst into tears 

when I have to look.

You won’t remember the day;

I do.

In late October.

Overfed rats groaned and hung

from a piece of string of the hook.

Months since it all,

you’ve finally ran along. 

And this young man

is taken away

whenever he’d see you. 

(2018)