She loves me, she loves me not

I don’t call it love

It is only memorizing her outfits

And making constellations out of the chips in her nail polish

Pretending the curls in her hair, strawberry blonde and sweet, were put there for someone who looks like me

It is merely storing memories of us inside hollows of willow trees

Using their swaying leaves as a shroud to hide our shared moments

We’re not in love

We’re just two souls made of the same stardust

Just two daydreams running parallel

Just two flower children trading daisy chains and flimsy crowns

Because we don’t need money where we’re going

We just need hope and flushed cheeks and running so fast you can’t see the blades of grass as you pass them

It’s not romantic, I swear

It’s just kicking rocks out of her way so she won’t trip because of their carelessness

It’s only clasped hands and running spring water washing away secret sins

It’s just that she doesn’t understand I listen when she speaks and wait patiently when she stutters

And I dance over the same puddles with her

I write all my best poems about her

And they’re not good, but she says they are anyway

So I keep writing about rosemary overflowing from hand-weaved baskets and poppy petals blushing in the space between her dimples

And she likes it when I romanticize the curve of her shoulders and the bend in her elbow

I don’t want it to stop

Because it’s not love

It doesn’t burn and break and splinter and cut, jagged edge gnawing at uncertainty

It takes root and stretches up where life was just a cigarette daydream, something to turn over in your palm like a piece of unidentifiable foreign currency

Something fleeting and never tarnishing

My sketchbook isn’t tainted by her

It is filled with curls and red lips and lovely girls who are not love