Adore/Love

This is my last poem that I wrote for my Intro to Creative writing class this semester. And yes, it is a love poem, but I really wanted to try and give it so much vivid imagery that it helps it escape the trappings of being a "typical love poem."

Adore/Love

One thousand, five hundred, and

ninety-eight miles. Yet I

can feel you, I am enveloped

in your embrace.

Your soft black hair tickles my cheeks, your head buried in the crook

of my neck.

You loathe

how short you are.

I adore it.

I want to scream

my feelings for you,

my lungs on the verge of bursting.

I want to hear from you,

across those miles that separate us.

But I remain quiet, keeping my tightly bound

confession for you between my pursed lips.

My admiration for you stretches and expands

farther than of those

who are strangers, only ice breakers on their minds,

“So how’s the weather today?”

Or even as classmates, our seats touching desk to desk,

“May I borrow your pencil?”

It has the innocence of a kindergarten crush,

The cliché of finding true love in the middle of a crosswalk,

that sweet sappy mush that clusters and collects in my arteries, courses through

my veins, leaves my heart thumping rapidly in the confines

of my chest. It is beating without abandon and

with absolutely no remorse.

You being and existing beside me, it is

ruining me.

I try to hold back, the wish

that you would hold my hand, long enough

that I could count every wrinkle and callous on the palm of yours.

The wish that you would hold me, the scent of

eucalyptus and mint stinging my nose,

The wish that you would kiss me.

Adore isn’t enough, such a simple

five letter word cannot express

what I feel for you.

Yet fewer letters could.

Love.

And while you're at it, I would be ecstatic if you were able to leave me a tip. Seriously, it would mean the world to me!