To the Person that Made Reality into Dreams

You are the film reel

I wanted to pull slowly

Across the projector

And relive every frame

 

As the years go on

I watch different clips

You see, I wanted

To catch the moments

When we first caught each other’s eyes

It was like a million stars exploded

In my chest

You could see it in the ways my eyes lit up

The debris that formed the freckles

Around the iris

 

When the spark of your heart

Set fire to my lips

I swear I’ve never wanted to burn

More than when your fingers

Sifted through my hair

And pulled me in close

I could almost taste our desperation

We were burning so fast

And we threw everything we knew

Into those flames

Wanting to burn brighter

Than that sunrise over the thoroughfare

God knows I lived in that moment

Far past our ashes

 

And here’s the scene, the day

I wrote you 100 reasons why

I love you

A couple months later

You wrote me 1,000

 

Or you, giddy in that pink dress

I love that smile, so full of life

It was like the whole room was mirrors

And you were some bright light

And everyone in it was more

Alive than they’d ever been

Once you walked in -

You still do that to rooms, you know -

Me with yellow roses

The irony of foreshadowing

But they were your favorite

 

The coffee shop we used to meet at

We got the table in the back

Wanted to keep it a secret

Just a little longer

You gave me a comic strip there -

Two snails and a tape dispenser

The caption defiantly read:

“I don’t care if she’s a tape dispenser, I love her.” -

The way our hands inched across the table

Cautiously fingertips touching

We told ourselves to be careful

We knew we’d burn the whole place down

 

Or when we would swing dance

Under the light of the blue moon

You teaching me how to

Laugh like no one was watching

Those sundresses spinning

The way our passion begged

To leave and dance some other way

With our skin pressed up against

One another

​

And then comes that part in the movie

When everything goes to shit

Your flame goes out

Mine tries to reignite you

Spark after spark flying onto you

But you’ve become someone else

Sparks don’t know what to hold to

You just get burned

I want to see the moment

In which you decided

That a thousand reasons

Wasn’t enough

 

It took years to

Know that I

Didn’t need you to be happy

In some ways I think

I might still be learning

That lesson

 

So here we are, friends

It doesn’t hurt to watch that movie anymore

In fact, it makes me believe

It’s possible again, but…

 

Every now and then I feel a spark

I’ll have a dream that we are still together

It doesn’t make sense to me

I let it pass, cottonwood in the wind

Float away

Like watching scenes of some film

So far away now

It was almost a dream