If That Wasn't Love, Then What Were We?
They tell me
“You’re too young to know what love is.”
Like love waits for a driver's license,
like it needs a mortgage and a 401k to be real.
But if I don’t know love,
then what were we?
What was the way my breath caught when your hand brushed mine, like my lungs forgot their only job?
What was the way my name sounded different in your mouth,
like it was never meant to be spoken by anyone else?
Was it just “infatuation” when we built universes in late-night whispers,
spun futures from fingertips tracing circles on skin,
stitched our souls together like we had forever to mend the seams?
They say love is patience,
love is wisdom,
love is something you only understand when you’ve paid bills and lost enough people to know it hurts.
But love is also reckless,
wild,
a fire that doesn’t check its own temperature.
And if we burned
God, did we burn
does that make it less real?
Because if that wasn’t love,
then tell me why your absence still sits heavy in my chest,
why the echoes of us haven’t faded,
why the ash of the fire from the bridges we burned still sits in my mind
If I don’t know love,
then what were we?
Because whatever we were
it still haunts me.
Copyright © Clowie Manard | Year Posted 2025
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