my future partner,

Hi, I’m anna. I guess we’re co-writing this chapter of our lives together. I’m sure it’ll be epic. It takes a while for me to viscerally latch onto another being, so congrats to you for stealing my heart
because if I’m with you, that probably means I really love you.

I like sushi a lot, empty bookstores, and tea sipping sessions with my cat, xiaoxiao, who you will probably hear me talk about twenty-four seven. I hope you’re a cat person.

Within the realm of the arts, I like to write poetry and play piano. But my secret hobby is photography. It’s the best way to know someone without really knowing them. And if you hurt me, I’ll probably create an entire musical composition or a playlist of poetry about it. But I’ll forgive you instantly.

I might make mistakes, too. For instance, I’m horrible with directions, remembering events, deadlines, or anything unrelated to pedantic learning. My erratic and changeable moods can be quite the predicament as well, but I promise to be as tolerable as I can be through my storms.
I’m a biomedical science major with a minor in neuroscience. Assimilating an array of medical innovations, education, and terminology is, personally, my zenith of academic interest. I have a love and longing to help others. But sometimes, moving towards this ultimate vocation is strenuous and I do hope you understand how much medicine means to me. This means late night MCAT study sessions, mountains of neuroscience books, stacks of terminology notecards, homework, and paramounts of stress.

But I want to work on that. I promise that whatever I love, I love to a seemingly boundless depth- “from the tip of my apex and beyond,” if you’re into medical puns. I promise I’ll take you out to dinner, plan cute dates, and spend as much quality time with you as I can. I promise, we’ll travel to so many places, eat all the food we can in all the countries we visit, dive in every ocean we can find, and fly over every country we can point to on a map.

Most importantly, I promise to give you reasons to continue the chapters in your book. Because I struggle with that too.
Whether it be in a month, a year, a decade, or a lifetime...

I promise to love you, see you soon

will you walk with me?
around the moon and beyond the stars
up and up
until our brains feel light and our lips turn blue

When we look over our shoulders
we notice the insignificance of things that are truly insignificant

the dog the car the microwave oven
that set of keys I lost and still can't find
the movie that comes out this weekend that you can't wait to see
my English degree
the lawn that we accidentally forgot to mow for four straight weeks
my mother
your mother
the way you take your coffee with milk and sugar
the list of unwatched romantic comedies on our Netflix que
the advice I get from Suze Orman
the indent your body made in my double bed
our leaky roof
your Dean's List grades and above average MCAT score
our set of home decor from IKEA that we assembled ourselves
Frank Zappa's Tinseltown Rebellion
that trip we always wanted to go on but never had the time to plan      
Our aspirations that we neatly folded up tucked away and pretended to forget.

Even you.

Even you. Even you don't affect the way the world turns.

No matter how hard we stomp or yell
or scream
or push or pull
or heave

We can't stop the world.
Not even for a second.