I'm not counting on anyone. But I see you... I see you and I know you see me and it's embarrassing and I feel so exposed, I can't even get myself to move away. I feel so vulnerable in your hands... I want to be vulnerable in your hands. I want to look you in the eyes and release my tongue from my teeth. I want to tell you everything and I want you to know nothing. I can't let you carry that. I want your hand on my back, tracing the place I rest my burden. I want you to speak to me until the sun rises. I want you to unfold at my feet, I want to tell you it's okay I want you to be okay. I need to be okay. I want to be me as me for you. I want you to know that. Will you hold her if I asked you to? Do you hold your breath when you're sitting next to me? The same way I hold mine? How much longer can I hold this feeling for myself? How can I wait? Resist? Will you wait? What is the edge I'm standing on right now? Am I supposed to jump? Will anyone jump with me? I think about what your hand might feel like. I don't care that much. I want to know what it looks like with my helpless heart placed in the center of your palm, beating furiously, blood running down your forearm. I'll sit back, pathetically. I love too fast. I love too simply. I love with the expectation that I'll be loved the same in return... forever. Unwavering. Unconditionally. I expect to be loved with my teeth bared, and just the same when I'm crying with my whole body.

sincerely, :)

You said you'd love me even if we had nothing-- people love saying that. Would you love me if you had everything? If the entire world was at your disposal, would you still choose to love me? It is easier to love in scarcity... because love is free and indulgent. I don't doubt that you would love me if we had nothing.

sincerely, II

I sit across from you and I tell you about things that don't matter all too much. Even still, my eyes lock into the static between us; a pleat on your shirt, your hand crossing the distance of the table, a paper napkin. I feel my voice leave my body but I'm unaware of what I'm saying. I'm focused on avoiding you, hiding from you. I catch my breath and I imagine it's the last one I get before the swell. A great blue whale, mouth agape, barnacles, turbulence, then darkness. And I am there in its damp, fleshy gut and I am in its damp fleshy gut with you. This is where I tell you I love you.

sincerely, II

And you held me with tight arms, your face tucked against my left ear. You held me so tightly I felt your heart beat against my back. Here, it became clear how I feel about you. The way you chose to hold me for the first time told me everything you believe about love.

sincerely, :/

you left fingerprints all over—my inner thighs, my collarbones, along my forearms; i tattooed over them. i walked past your (old?) place tonight, with my friends, laughing about how whirlwind our romance was. the tea you made me after the first night i slept beside you on that mattress on the living room floor. did your roommates hear? it's funny now, isn't it? sometimes i don't want it to be funny. i still think that i trusted you, was vulnerable with you, in a way i wasn't with anyone else. you shook me awake from a dull dream. are you sleeping now?

sincerely, anon

the piano man, the one with the baby grand on wheels, played the theme from amelie in washington square park tonight. i caught a whiff of the razor sharp soprano notes, cutting like a taught string through the dark. grappling hook-like. you appear in the most unexpected moments, the ones where i used to look for you but you never were. so i stopped looking, you know how it goes. there you are. remember when we sat on the bench by the arch, christmastime, and saw that dog with mottled, pink-and-green dyed fur? there's a sculpture in the arch now. of a couple breaking through a cage, holding each other.

sincerely, X

i want it to be you. i've always wanted it to be you. you, who re-wrote "gigantic" by the pixies and sang it to me on a voicemail because i was asleep. i listen to it more often than i'd like to admit. i've always wanted it to be you, you who keeps recipes on paper taped to your cabinets, you who always fills the big glass with water before bed, you whose hair feels the best beneath my fingers. 

sincerely, X

Last night, with the mourning dove dawn breaking through your window, I awoke to you thrashing in the throes of a nightmare, your arms and legs twitching like a dog’s (you know, The way they run in dreams). I decided not to wake you because someone told me once you only remember the dreams you wake up during; if I can protect you from that pain, you know I will. So I stayed, laying there listening to your heart beating, wishing I could slip silently into that world no one else knows and make It All Right.

sincerely, X

for what it’s worth, i think i managed to witness the way you experience love. it was quick, and if i blinked i would’ve missed it entirely, but thankfully i was too shocked to look away. i saw it materialize in little gestures and expressions and it was playful and shameless and whimsically passionate and it scared me, briefly, because i didn’t know if i was supposed to accept it or not. i haven’t let myself think too much of it, but i’m glad to have witnessed it nonetheless. you are a beautiful lover, and i mean that in the exact same way that weird old men try to compliment women; it was beautiful because i don’t think you knew it was happening. you proved to me that something like that exists in others, and i’m excited thinking about how i might be able to practice that for myself (will i be aware of it?). it was after xxx when it changed; you becoming too aware and me feeling too responsible. it was around then that i started preparing myself for hurt, and so that’s why i am here now & capable… capable of having enjoyed whatever i still could without attachment or expectation. love is a laserquest after all and i will play over and over again because i fear none of it; to pursue and be pursued, the surprise around the corner. i figured a while back that once you start taking it seriously, you forget the feeling. we take everything too seriously now, the least we can offer ourselves is silly love. but i wont close this out yet because at the time i’m writing this, i’m not sure in what circumstances i’d be telling you all of this… if at all. am i contradicting myself in that way? is hopefulness just cheap deceit? at the time i’m writing this, you might tell me goodmorning soon and i will tell it to you back and we will move through another month as we have. and for reasons i attribute to mere time, i have a feeling we will understand something by the end of it.

sincerely, laserquest pro team

We sat in the backseat of my car and you said “I know this is the end so let me kiss every inch of you so I can remember” and I drove home and knew it couldn’t be forever. That wasn’t the end, but it might as well have been. You taught me the beauty of someone placing a warm drink that they made in your hands, and I forever associate that with love now, and think of you. I hope you are well. I wish I knew better.

sincerely, yy

I hated you and because of that I let you love me. I think you tried. At the very least, you sat with me while I ate. You taught me what real love would feel like because you showed me everything that it wasn’t. I wouldn’t be able to appreciate what I have now without you. Thank you.

sincerely, pu

We grew up together. We learned side by side all the big adult things: politics, taxes, money, cleaning a bathroom. You shrunk my favorite silk dress, I learned to do the laundry. We couldn’t be enough for each other, but you stood by me when I didn’t have a clue. We went through the worst days together. I maybe couldn’t have done that alone. Sometimes I still speak in our language, I know no matter what I’ll carry a part of those years with me. Thanks for not letting me sink, but I needed to fly and so did you. I hope in letting you go you’ve been able to too.

sincerely, nini

I stopped loving you but it’s hard to stop missing you and maybe I never will, but I have to thank you for letting me know what to look for. Driving across the bridge, listening to The Style Council, the world silent and starlit. Trusting you. I would’ve done anything for you darlin, and you know that, but you wouldn’t let me. That’s okay. You gave me a place to rest my head and dream more times than I can count. For a long time I wished it would be you but it couldn’t be, but you taught me how to stand in front of someone and feel my heart break, in a good way, in a bad way. Thank you for the scars and scratches, the calluses. Loving you as much protected me until I was ready to try again. I’m glad it was you for so long.

sincerely, r

i used to think that love was the anxiety i felt. the heartbeat racing, thoughts unending, adrenaline rush. i used to believe that i was unlovable and that if someone loved me i had to grasp on so tight because who knew when i would get this chance again. i used to cry and run and feel so much that i had to push everyone away. that was until i met you. my heart slowed, my pulse steadied, my mind cleared. i learned that love is clarity. love is peace in body and mind. i learned to love through loving you. i saw my flaws and my wounds and i know that with you i didn't have to run anymore. you love me calm and quiet and kind. you love me through laughter that i didn't know existed. i know real love with you. the kind of love that glows soft and warm. i love you.

sincerely, M