I am by no means omnipotent,
So the meta-thoughts I have
About the couples on this day
Are quite biased.

I have to wonder
What these people are thinking
When vigorously presenting their love
Without even a shred of conscience
Or shame.

ah
so this
is what lips
are for

I’m caught up in this air,
Smelling of chocolates...
And human hearts.
Now I can only think
Of the one that stole mine,
And why I gave up so soon.

Maybe things were meant to be,
And eye-to-eye’s what we truly see.

Silently bearing its teeth,
My emotions pounce onto me.
Nothing’s to happen,
But the morrow is unnerving.
My mind sprouts fantasies
Like the spring grows dandelions.
Soon the flowers change
And I’ll whisp away with the wind.
Soon the bees will come
And sting my body numb.

I put my faith in pinky promises
and astrology apps.
It isn’t our mistakes that first come to mind
when I think of us,
Though they certainly do.
Instead, I remember the French cafe
From where I can no longer bring myself
to buy hot chocolate.
Instead, I remember curling up in a plastic chair,
feeding two quarters to a payphone
dropped them more than once
in my excitement for ten minutes of your time.
From Winter Beach Weddings to
Three months of “missing my calls”
I’m not quite sure how we got here.
High school rock music shook my skull.
I thought my kneecaps would pop off
and leave me sprawled on the auditorium floor.
Her angelic voice made my ears bleed.
A colossal, though unintentional, “*******”.
First heartbreaks are like golden retriever puppies:
They contain infinite stores of energy that somehow manage
to refill themselves after only a few hours’ rest.
Their blonde hair is everywhere.
You are everywhere.
We were like George and Lennie:
“clinging together in the face of loneliness and alienation”.
It was never going to end well.
And I could write (have written)
so many bitter, hurt, apologetic heartbreak poems
a million stanzas that are essentially
paraphrased Waterparks lyrics.
But none of this will change the fact
that I likely won’t receive an Orange-Crush soda
on Valentine’s Day.

For my sons and their wives.
For my friends and their wives
For my friends and their husbands.
May no challenge in life be more important
Than the bond of your true love.
May you live in kindness.
May you live in love.
May your hearts dance in eternal joy.
Forever and ever in Love.