We are too old for this kind of heartache —
or so we’ve been told by people
who married convenience and called it wisdom.
We know better.
Yet here we are, two grown adults
lying awake like teenagers who just discovered
that longing is a full-body injury.
You, with your poems written into fog,
treating autumn like a confessional.
Me, pretending I’m composed
until you send me one sentence
that detonates three hours of restraint.
We should be sensible.
We should be practiced at goodbyes by now.
We should have scar tissue thick enough
to muffle this.
Instead,
you breathe on a camera
and my pulse forgets how old I am.
You turn your robe slightly to the side
and my soul files for reincarnation
just to get closer.
People our age are supposed to settle.
To dim. To make peace with realism.
But I refuse.
You refuse.
So here we are —
two world-weary fools
relearning how to blush
in different time zones,
trapped in the wrong countries
with the right person.
Call it pathetic.
Call it holy.
Either way, it’s ours.
And if this is teenage love
arriving decades late,
then let it stay.
Let it rattle our bones
like lockers slammed in school hallways.
Let it keep us writing
when even sleep gives up.
Let distance stay jealous.
Let time feel threatened.
I’ll be forty+ going on sixteen
if it means I get to want you
with this kind of accuracy.