Memoirs Of A Teenage Heart

I love you

I love you

If I have fifteen years

or fifteen minutes

left to my life,

I’d use them to promise you

how terribly much

I love you.

Yes, you,

behind the screen,

wondering who I’m writing about.

It’s you,

It has always been,

and always will be, about you.

I wanted so much more than this.

I wanted to taste Alaska’s

Aurora Borealis.

I wanted to raise my palms up

and let it stain the tips

of my fingers.

And I wanted to bleed it into ink

so that I could share it

with you.

I wanted us to hold the world together,

to let the sunlight sleep softly atop

our cheeks on a Summer’s day.

I wanted to keep

the Autumn leaves

between the pages of my poetry,

that way you’d know

that nothing truly

has to fall away.

I wanted time to promise you

how deeply I have loved

your imperfections.

I wanted to profess my heart

and bury it in the sound

of your name.

Do you see why

I have wanted to go

to the salt flats in Utah?

They say when it rains

the flats reflect the skies and this

is how we could have held the horizon.

We’d stand on the borderline

between heaven and Earth

and I’d be with you,

And all at once, all at once,

our tears would have

a purpose at last.

We could hold the sky

against our palms

and understand

why it was that Atlas

must bear the world

atop his shoulders.

I wanted so much more than this.

But if I have fifteen years,

or fifteen minutes,

I’d use every last breath

to promise you, darling,

that I love you.

Always.