'Love At First Blush'

'Love At First Blush' - Is A Hard Pill To Swallow

Deemed school’s most promising alumni,

We know each other in name alone.

Fate keeps us apart for years,

Ahead in work, staving off fears.

A plan contrived to have us meet,

Was how this day finally came to be.

It was a charity event or a ceremony –

Whichever it is now ,

Seems irrelevant somehow.

The world is at a standstill,

For your eyes have now met mine.

Though the room rings with your praises of me,

Deciphering those words is an impossibility.

My own ears fill with the pounding of blood;

The heart, an innocent traitor, begins its little race.

"It's love!" It sings, feverishly driving me.

"It's like they've known you an eternity!"

Only how could that be?

We'd only just met.

I wasn't willing to believe, so readily.

But the feeling thrummed:

Surging up and over,

Over the din of the mind,

Shocking yet stubbornly alive.

I close my eyes weakly,

The shadow of your presence grows near.

Around you the room blends into a rosy mural;

Festive lights cast the only glow;

The world drops back, reduced to a mere whisper.

Your breath assumes centre stage;

Its steady cadence – awakens skin .

Heat creeps up my neck, settles in my cheeks –

Suffusing them with a deeper rose hue.

Never in my life had I been so aware of sensation:

Galvanic thunder tears through,

– And, this something,

A rending wave, strikes blinding hot. ( Are you feeling this too?)

Time speeds up but freezes all around.

The heart's wild march never slows;

Lurching higher, rebounding in its cage.

Blood roars, drumming up a frenzied pulse in my throat.

The whole body objects the stifled air,

– And, this something,

This something –

Threatens to unfurl, to unravel me,

To strangle, to choke me.

The heart's mutiny against the will,

It's hard to swallow – this pill.

I swallow with restraint,

I swallow and resist,

I swallow yet it persists,

Knowing I want to be swallowing you.

To swallow, to consume.

To swallow, to subsume.

I want you.

I want you now.

I know that what separates us,

Is but a few insignificant moments –

Where we’d yap, tongues slapping, getting niceties out of the way.

I know what we could be –

A strong force when combined as one.

You must be feeling this too. (Are you feeling this too?)

Our bodies contract in the stillness of the moment;

Acknowledging the growing presence –

Of something more

Hanging suspended between us,

There is something more,

We are no longer strangers.

I steal a glance at you,

Your eyes are closed, you’re smiling.

You are peaceful; already I know – this is a rare occurrence for you.

You’ll get used to the calm, now that you have me .

I want to share what’s possessed me:

It's blazing hot –

Strong and certain.

I’ll embrace you,

I’ll build you up,

You, I’ll carry.

For you, I will –

Be

There

Always.

I steal ever closer to you;

Before I even know what I'm doing,

My arm catches your side in an embrace.

I rush to appologise, to withdraw –

You stop me.

I search your face,

I meet your eyes:

There's light amusement glinting in their depths,

And, marking your cheeks – two spots of colour.

"You're blushing!" I laugh, and my breath catches –

You smile.

A true smile –

One that, I learn, is reserved only for me.