I could say that perfect love will show up in my front yard with roses and

“I Got You Babe” playing on the boombox in the rain.

I could say that I’m entertaining the idea of unequal yearning:

I could secretly fall in love with the cheerleader,

hang fairy lights in the janitor’s closet.

I could cut my hair, move to Cuba, and tell my parents

I’m just giving up their dreams.

I could lament about the unavoidable fact that adoration lives

in the power of taking off my glasses and letting my hair down.

But, in reality, love only emerges from living.

It shakes the dust off the romantic comedies that forgot me in the credits.

It assures me that I exist for me before I exist for others,

that the hands that wrap around me as I dance in front of my bedroom mirror

are familiar, are comfort, are mine.

It ebbs and flows, hugs me like a sister on some days,

hides from me on others.

It’s taught me that I enjoy walks at 5am before the world is awake,

that my first words to myself each day must be kind,

that I enjoy traveling alone,

for poems, for peace, for high, for magic.

I wake up today and yesterday and tomorrow,

falling in love with discovering myself.

I’m the person in the yard with the boombox, scream-singing about loving me.

I’m falling in love at the gordita spot, at the general store, at the karaoke joint, or with my smile in the mirror.

I’m falling in love with living and living abundant love.