i don't even like tulips.

Dear  you,

It's 2:47 AM right now
and I should be reading a case study
on Charles Le Brun, 'art dictator of France'
but instead I am inventing new ways
to give words to the feeling in my chest.

I can't stop making metaphors about you
and for you and towards you because
you are a hole dug deep in my garden
that I really should fill in but for some reason
I keep telling myself I'll plant flowers there.

You are a reminder to all the things
I have done wrong and a reminder
to all the things I have done right
and you are a reminder of all the bad habits
I once tried to break but can't shake off.

I would be your pet goldfish if you wanted
but I'm not sure if I could be anything more
because I'm too awkward to breathe in oxygen
and the air you exhale is toxic anyway
so I think I'll be safer in a fishbowl.

Curiosity has me reaching up
for that cookie jar on top of the fridge
my mother told me to leave alone
but I'm not even sure there are cookies inside
and I'm dying to know if the jar is empty.

The problem with all these metaphors
is that some of them aren't actually
metaphors but are just too damn
literal to be anything but completely
and entirely too real.

He told me I was a rabbit hole of emotions
and I told him I understood why he wouldn't want
to be Alice again because let's face it
no one really wants to go mad no matter how much
madness is romanticized in the movies.

I just want to apologize in advance
because I have handed you too many things
without checking to see if your hands
were even open in the first place
and I'll understand if you accidentally drop a few of them.

It's 3:34AM right now
and I still haven't read that case study
because I'm too busy trying to understand
my case study of you and all these metaphors
about you and me and the feelings in my chest.

I think they might be called love.

Sincerely,
xx
Blue