I used to think love
was some all encompassing entity
that it overcame most adversity and
saw 20/20
what we couldn't without it

we've heard that love is letting go
love is or isn't, does or does not
we all have our rules, our commonplace
conceptions, loads of ideologies
a garrison of things we've tolerated
in the name of such, love was always
tolerable,
would not yell,  would show up
at my door, curl my hair around
his fingers as if it were
twine, you have
read the poems
i've written about
what I thought
love would
be.

but if somewhere i know what
love is then it is buried deep,
it is lost in translation,
a text settled into the
bottom of his inbox
ground into the floorboards
of his truck, a phrase he
zips up and away
because it applies to me
but in the worst kind of way
packs it into the chamber
and fires

so this is a new renaissance
because I no longer think
of love as a solid form, as
a person, as the suitor in
that poem by Jane Kenyon
love looked like Matt and
was all types of wild
was me asking at 6 am
please do not regret
this.


if somewhere I know what love
is, then it is buried deep
in packed soil, lost in
translation, a few words
that don't even reach
the intended audience.