dying in love.
do I know how to be in love at all?
Maybe, I do not know how to be in love at all. We talk all day. I stare at him, going off about the state of the world. My head still spinning of uncertainty but I sit there delicate and happy. Said I remind him of the Renaissance. He finds me smart, resourceful. When he eats, he is loud, navigates his food ravenously. I cannot accept it. I accept it. I decided it makes him manly. Love is a choice, in this way, yes? Or is it simply romanticizing to have grace for the things we hate?
Typically, when in this position— talking stages, dating; I imagine other places I could be. I will sit with a man and daydream about what I will cook when I get home, relish while I contemplate how I will slip under my sheets all alone, and decide what I will watch in his absence. What bills I need to pay first. What does my kid need this week. Once with a man, do I yearn to be alone?
But tonight is different. I make sure I’m paying attention while he dogmatizes about late-stage feminism. It is precisely at this moment that I feel important. Bored and satiated. Short curly rough black hair sitting under his cap, dark eyes, tiny strands of grey in his beard, unbearably human. I study him, study me, questioning myself, wondering if I can love him at all. What parts of me need to die to love you?
I feel like I can only fully love him if I stop loving myself. If I sit next to him for too long I’ll have the urge to be destitute, the most pathetic version of myself, is that what it takes, to love him. Strong woman, walls down, a broken city traded for the heart of man.
It is dinner time, and I only feel like I fully want him when he starves me of affection. Too forthcoming, and I don’t feel hungry enough. Dinner won’t taste as good. Hollow is a hunger, fed by a larger void. I will find fault with you as long as you love me. And I will trade you—your apathy, for my affection. I need you not to need me. So, perhaps I don’t know how to be in love at all. At least not without dying as it unfolds.
Deliver me, my Jesus. Deliver me, my Jesus.
I am writing you love letters from Hilo.
I pray you read this with hope and love. With joy and expectation— knowing Jesus loves you but more importantly He needs you to grow up— in your word reading, praying, believing, hoping, looking for His return.
All my love,
G.
