you, tender

me, tenderer still

down in the long, tall witchgrass where you professed your everlasting love

in the simple terms of a creek trickle,

and then handed me a sour-apple popsicle.

 

 

...is there such a thing as raw love?

seared and bruised and cut and dried out,

(but always, always there)

my punch-drunken and misled affectations carving tell-tale fever marks

onto your bright, fresh heart.

 

 

tears of tacit remarks trail unchecked through the shadows,

and the more you understood

the less I comprehended

trample-dancing, you tugged and pulled until you got

the piece of my heart you'd forgotten not to fall for,

 

 

and I wondered what you meant when you said you loved me.