I’ve read every book of love
Drank in every tale
Given myself to a hundred fantasy lovers
Felt their phantom kisses
Laid them to rest in caves of longing
I’ve watched the wells within go dry
Tombstones rolled up in front
I’ve felt love die in me
I’ve believed in others’ fairytales
Celebrated love in all its forms
Young, old, fast, slow, long, short
Given gifts and blessings and directions
Though I could never find the way myself
I’ve heard time ticking away at my girlhood
Choking flowers out with weeds
Wondered if love for me was just a dream
Suddenly here is a man of flesh and bone
He writes books of love
Traces poems on my arm
His eyes are fountains of youth
Sending bubbles through my veins
The stone is rolled away and the light let in
Life starts to grow now by sunlight and fountain streams
Suddenly it’s my time
The far-off fantasy is here
The one I paid tribute to for years
The air is charged here
In the magnetic field between eyes and hands
I’m pulled in, suspended in midair, dissolved into his arms
And love takes hold of me
Suddenly gone is the girl
Who had to excavate for signs of love
Today I don’t have brain space to count them
She’s faded into the past as quickly as this new life came
I wonder if she was just a dream