Say la vee.

do you remember the first time you were called annoying? how your breath stopped short in your chest the way the light drained from your eyes, though you knew your cheeks were ablaze the way your throat tightened as you tried to form an argument that got lost on your tongue. your eyes never left the floor that day. you were 13. you’re 20 now, and i still see the light fade from your eyes when you talk about your interests for “too long,” apologies littering every other sentence, words trailing off a cliff you haven’t jumped from in 7 years. i could listen to you forever, though i know speaking for more than 3 uninterrupted minutes makes you anxious. all i want you to know is that you deserve to be heard for 3 minutes for 10 minutes for 2 hours forever. there will be people who cannot handle your grace, your beauty, your wisdom, your heart; mostly because they can’t handle their own. but you will never be and have never been “too much.”

THIS IS WHAT LOVE FEELS LIKE; at the beginning, when it’s all shy smiles and butterflies and little bumps of the hand, it feels like one of those sparklers you use to write your name in the dark on a beach in july. it’s warm, and pretty, and fun, and sometimes stray sparks land on the backs of your hands but you love it. when shy smiles turn into first kisses and butterflies turn into fireworks, it feels like a wildfire. it’s hot and roaring and uncontrollable and it consumes you, just like it consumes entire forests and burns them to the ground. you should feel it inside you, raging in your veins and in your heart and in your lungs. when the first kisses turn into seconds and thirds and fourths and the fireworks turn into a safety in your bones, it feels like a blazing hearth at christmas time. it should feel safe, happy, cozy, like you’re finally home. THIS IS WHAT LOVE DOESN’T FEEL LIKE; love doesn’t feel like a crumbly candle in a musty motel room when the kisses are rushed and sloppy because you’re afraid the candle’s going to melt down and burn out before you can get your clothes off. love doesn’t feel like arson, when you’ve burned a house to the ground looking to feel the crackling warmth of love. that’s the difference between a forest fire and arson - one happens on its own and the other is forced. love doesn’t feel like an explosion caused by a match dropped in front of an open gas main. love is not explosive or destructive. it does not rip your skin off and expose the bones in your face or walk away with an arm and a leg when it burns out.

“People don’t like love, they like that flittery flirty feeling. They don’t love love - love is sacrificial, love is ferocious, it’s not emotive. Our culture doesn’t love love, it loves the idea of love. It wants the emotion without paying anything for it. It’s ridiculous.”