When describing the way
I love you
there are several approaches I could take.

I could use a long drawn-out cliché.
Expressing how my love for you is
boundless, limitless, and unconditional.

I could compare the two of us to iconic lovers.
Prophesizing that our love will go down in history with
Romeo & Juliet, Jack & Rose, or Lucy & Ricky.

I could conduct an ornate chain of events.
Demonstrating the immense love I have for you through a
Choreographed flash mob, a pile of gifts, or grand acts of service.

Why would I do any of this when
our love is completely unique
and is more complex than a simple three word phrase.

I cannot find anything comparable.
Our love is distinguished in
its origin, its demonstration, and its depth.

Trying to find a way to describe my love for you
I feel myself becoming quite
Lovey dovey & overly tender.

These are the feelings all people in love express.
What is so distinctive about us
you may be asking?

Our love is built on:
Gingerbread houses
Kitchen slow dancing
Matching pajamas sets
Three-dollar wine
Quarantine movie marathons
Mario Kart tournaments
Sunset walks
Cooking competition shows

This is the foundation of our love.
Our early, goofy memories
allowed us to bond incredibly close, incredibly fast.

I learned the obscure details about you.
The way your hair grows in a hurricane pattern
The way you sigh and succumb to the couch after a long day
The way the left corner of your mouth smiles before the right
The way you can’t sleep without noise in the background
The way you never fail to eat your salad after your main course
The way you step heavier in your heels rather than your toes
The way you can taste the difference between Frank’s Red Hot and the off brand
The way you spray your cologne only on special occasions

I hope that these reasons show you
how serious I am when I say
I love you more.

But not more than you love me, but
More than there are stars in the sky,
More than there are days in an eternity,
More than there are rays of sunshine,
More than there are craters on the moon,
More than there are grains of sand in the desert,
More than there are snowflakes in a blizzard.

My love for you is infinite.
I will never stop loving you,
Forever & Always.

Those I love the most
but are psychically distant
know the least about me.

I wasn't sure at what point
my feelings of
inadequacy and failure
would penetrate the boundaries
of my thoughts and
manifest themselves in a physical way
which scare not only the strangers
that pass me on the street
and see my now skeletal body
but also those I love the most.

Swaddled within your arms,
I feel my worries rush away
from my thoughts.
I am left with only
complete clarity
about my future with you.
My anxieties
seem to simply evaporate
when our limbs intertwine.

I was scared at first.
The voice started
drifting in slowly.
It crept in and dimmed
the shining lights that
kept me bright and shiny.
Such as the morning fog
consumes the mountains
was the voice in my mind.
I was scared at first,
but no longer.
The dark thoughts
are constant and persistent
but no longer worry me.
It is hard to find a light
when I am trapped by
all these shadows.
What scares me now
is not the voice itself
but is the fact that
I have fallen in love with it.

While you might look
at the months ahead
and see feasts,
and shared tables,
and celebratory treats,
and memories made in the kitchen.
I see hours needed on the treadmill,
and calories needing to be logged,
and pounds gained,
and hours crying on the bathroom floor.
I no longer see the holidays
as a joyous time full of laughs
but rather as a 3 month long
depressive purge.

Everyday,
multiple times
you remind me of my beauty
because I can no longer
do this for myself.
You tell me that one day
I will believe these words.
They will eventually sink
into my DNA.
You tell me the words will
one day feel real and until they do
you will continue on.
You do not make me
feel ashamed that these words
are foreign to my diseased brain.
While you call me breathtaking
I tell myself I am not deserving of breath.
Your words restore me.
They keep me alive
until the next dosage of
your selfless reminders.