Occasionally I come across a person with brown eyes,
and I compliment them on those peepers.

More often than not, they laugh and say,
"Oh, they're just brown."
Or
"They're **** colored."
Or
"I wish I had blue/green/hazel eyes."

I want to grab them by the shoulders,
pull them close to me,
look into those eyes and say,
"Your eyes are alluring, deep, and warm."

Eyes the color of delicious coffee,
of which I want to gulp every last drop.
Eyes the color of ancient leather,
the binding of the best books.
Eyes the color of the soft soil,
from which everything good grows.

I say,
"Love your eyes, it's how the rest of us see into your soul."

Brown eyes are my favorite eyes.
Brown eyes make me feel like I am home.

i want to kiss you
at every red light
both figuratively and literally

i want to kiss you
when life gets hard
and when **** happens

i want to kiss you
in the 30 seconds we have
at each intersection

i want to kiss you
always.

you say these butterflies will fly away eventually
but we could choose for them to stay
the nectar on your skin is sweet enough
to keep them coming back

butterflies need to keep moving, flying all around
so we'll leave them in our stomachs
and give them the freedom that our love allows

we'll name each butterfly after our favorite candies
because we feel sweet inside
filled up with each other's love

when a storm hits i don't want the butterflies to flee
after all a storm fades into light
even when things get hard, our love will remain
because the butterflies gather for things deeper than beautiful feelings

i want to remember
exactly what you looked like
the day i first met you

i want to remember
the way you said my name
and tapped your fingers
on the table
because you were nervous

i want to remember
the way you walked
and the way you ordered
your coffee

i want to remember
the shirt you wore
and the way
you did your hair

i want to remember
it all;
every little piece of you

and then I asked you,
"What's your biggest fear?"

you gave me a quivering sigh,
looked at me straight in the eyes
and said,

"It's that eventually, you will see me
the way I see myself."

i wrote a lot of great poetry when i was in love
i wrote even better poetry when i was in pain
i wrote the best poetry when i realized that the two emotions were actually the same.

they are my famiglia
they are italian, polish and maltese,
probably a lot of other things too
we're basically mutts
there are five of us, if you include the dog
they are the best

there's my mom;
i call her "ma" or "woman" or "mom" or "mama" or "rochelle", if i want to irritate her
she's the best cook in the world
she always calls me her "bambina"
and sings me songs and writes me cute notes
she's my best friend and biggest fan (sorry dad)
i'm convinced she can read my mind,
even when i'm 2 1/2 hours away, she can tell when something's wrong
she's the best mom in the world

and then, there's my dad;
i call him "dad" or "daddy" or "bob" because he doesn't seem to care
he's hilarious and actually tells good dad jokes
he loves talking about
government conspiracies and
new health trends he's trying
he calls my mom just to say "i love you" and buys me flowers on valentine's day because "i want you to know what a man should do for you one day"
he's so great, i hope i marry a man like bob one day

and there's my brother;
i call him "bro" or "broski" or usually just, "bobby"
he loves me with all his heart
but cannot hug me
because his ocd clouds his mind
he's funny and loves the oldies
he also loves trips to chipotle with me
he won't tell me about girls
because "you'll tell mom," but will talk to me about everything else
gosh i love him with all my heart too

and there's my dog;
who we all call "boo" and sometimes i call him some random nickname
he's so cute, but super vicious
one minute he'll be curled up in-between your legs and the next?
he's attacking you and biting you in the lip
he's scared of thunderstorms and fireworks and people, really he's scared of everything
he's not perfect, but he loves me and i love him

and then, there's me;
they call me "dee-dee" or "aubs" or plain old, "aubrey"
i'm the first born pain in the ****,
who's dream is to marry a nice christian man, own a cafe, adopt children, have children, and just have a great family
currently, i'm in college, missing my great family
my current dream would be, sitting on the couch with my dog on my lap, my mom cooking in the kitchen, my dad hanging out in the garage building something cool, and my brother playing video games and complaining about me taking over the bathroom we share.

can you tell i miss them?
can you tell i love them?