Rachel Seitz
When I wake at 7am in your studio apartment and you’re still sleeping
I can hear your heart beat
Into my ear
Resting against your chest
This is the most calm I’ve ever felt your heart
(when I’ve been with you)
Is it me or is it you or is it both of us and both of our expectations
and both of our insecurities and both of our skepticism
Or is that just me?
Or is it your adoration your affection your emotional instability
That makes your heart beat fast when you see me
but not when you can’t see me?
Maybe I just have that effect on you
Maybe the rose colored glasses you put on are your normal glasses
and mine are just lackluster compared to the deep pink cashmere you see
I think I might be thinking into it too much but I also think I have to after you told me
you loved me
And I had to say no, you don’t love me
You love the idea of me
you love the idea of being in love, but
you don’t love me
And I think that’s why when I wake before you
in your studio apartment
nowhere to go nowhere to hide nowhere to think that isn’t visible
to you
I think that’s why
I can’t help but cling to you to the idea of you to the idea of love
but not to the idea of loving you
Not quite yet.
Because if I do that, if
I let that shield down if I say:
yes, I love you, I’m in love
with you
I don’t want to be in love with
Anyone.
Else.
Ever.
I’m afraid that you will say the same thing
And that we will be “happy”
But happy is fickle happy LEAVES happy doesn’t stay for the 3am nights
when you can’t sleep when you’re stressed when you’re sick when you’re insecure
when you’ve been together so long that 3am when you can predict
when you’ll leave to use the bathroom and come back at precisely 3:02am
But I want it I want to lay with you in your studio apartment
at 11pm at 3am at 7am at 4pm at—
That’s all I could ever ask for.
And I hope that when you ask for someone to love you
you will do it in person face-to-face inches away
with a smile on your face
with your cheeks turning as rosy as those glasses that have been embedded in your eyes
I hope that you will see
everything
everything
in such a way that makes you “happy”
Though I guess it would be better to say a way that makes you whole that completes you that complements you and compliments you
and fights you and disagrees with you and holds your hands when you drive
and squeezes your fingers when you stop too fast and—
I hope you get that for you.
And I hope I get that for you, too.