Tell me, please,
what makes you think I’m not capable
of loving you.
What makes you think that I’ve
never fallen in love with boys who
had nightmares so horrible that they wouldn’t sleep
for days upon days and boys who hallucinated
six crows always circling above my eyes.
Let’s not forget the boy who cringed
and cried when I touched him,
because of where his father’s hands wandered when
he was only five years old.

Tell me, please,
why I don’t know how to love people
who are easy to love,
or why you think that you are some
drastic case of sorrow, survivor’s guilt,
and enough anxiety and depression to bury the world -
you are not. I’ve loved people
who had laid themselves in
deeper graves than you.
Believe me, there is enough scar tissue around my heart
to handle loving every single
part of you.

Darling,
you are not exempt from love.