love is a four-letter word

While I was a little girl, I was obsessed with the idea of true love.

I had always daydreamed of white horses and bouquets of roses; my prince coming to rescue me.

Grandfather time has seemed to have changed a lot of things,

Some of our old scars just never seem to heal.

Pieces of my scattered heart had been bound together with broken bits of tiny string and bits of tape.

As I grew up, older, and wiser, I had truly begun to give up on the fantasy idea of my truest love.

My inner child knew that he was still out there,

I had prayed for him to come and find me one day; even if there were now layers upon layers of armor for him to find me within.

Little did I know that my sweet prince would show up on his skateboard to come rescue me.

With his silver pocket knife in hand, slowly but surely, he began unwinding the tightly wrapped layers upon layers of tape from my broken heart.

I had waited so long, impatiently within my broken agony.

Everything that I wanted in life, had rested within those soft brown eyes.

Our shadow selves had stitched themselves back together with the broken pieces of string that we had collected along our journey.

My perspective had changed greatly on my thoughts on love throughout the years.

Love is not in those huge grand gestures, but within those tiny actions every day.

Homemade cups of tea for our stitched-up hearts.

Filthy love letters written in our favourite colours of ink.

Cloudy smoke filled our lungs as we shouted with laughter.

Is this what it feels like to be taken care of?

Is this what being able to trust someone fully feels like?

Love is using your first name within your poems,

Love is feeling safe enough within you to be yourself around him, without judgement.

Allowing him to see you at your worst, but still having him still see you as the best.

That is truly what love is to me.

Somehow, within this crazy whole pandemic, I found him within the impossible.

He filled my heart and soul with liquid gold,

After all that they had felt was numb and cold for so long.

His soul feels so much like home to me.

I forgot how warm that it could feel; to be loved.

To feel wanted by someone.

I could feel his whole heart within my own.

Through our terrible pizza pandemic picnics and late-night conversations,

I drooled over our solen mask covered kisses,

I fell hard down, deeper than I ever intended to.

Our inner demons had appeared to make a match.

Somehow, his soul had made mine feel so much more.

Much more loving and whole, more like myself than I had felt in so long.

For the first time, this battered and broken-down heart had felt more than enough.

I never knew how warm a love like this could feel.

I wonder if I will ever grow tired of listening to your honey-filled voice.

That would speak to me within sweet nothings.

I wonder, is this what true happiness can feel like?

How were we so lucky to become lost and found within each other?

A love like this one had been created for fairy tales and romance songs.

Grandfather time had been more than fair to us within this pandemic stricken nightmare.

As our little story seems to go,

Love is a four-letter word that will always simply remind me of you.