"Write me a poem,"
you ask, "that begins,
'Roses are red.'" And I can't tell
if you really want
a poem, or just to know
I love you.

So I assume you want
a love poem. But this
is where things get difficult.
There are two types of love
poems. First, the type I prefer
to write, that begins to speak
of love, but then becomes
distracted, self-aware,
changing direction mid-course
to speak to the whole
of humanity, summing the emotion
into a succinct phrase
that explains everything about life
and nothing about reality;
the type, in short, that is neither clever
nor a love poem.

Then there is the type, written
a billion times before, that speaks
of sunset across a golden beach,
or from a mountain top; of quiet
breeze-swept summer nights spent
whispering sweet nothings
and falling asleep beside a fire;
the type you deserve, and I am afraid
to write.

I tried to write
it before, this love poem
that is yours and only
yours (in spite of how may times
written by another), and cowered
before the proud fear
of generations of poets
laughing, jeering "is that all
you could come up with?"

Or perhaps cowering not before the fear
of mass anonymity, but a need
for my love to be greater
than that felt a billion times before;
so that when you reach
for my hand across a couch
and smile, it is not simply
something that has happened every day
since the dawn of time,
but that the universe is rolling
into one singular sphere
around us, and exploding
again, rebirthing itself
in your eyes.

Or perhaps cowering before the vision
of some future year; I, remembering
this poem, longing
to breathe your silk hair as it brushes past
my lips one last time.

How do I speak it--
this thing never said but exhaled
between every stutter of thought,
every silence of our riverside stroll
along the cool evening;
I, fumbling for the elegance
to build upon that which is only obvious,
that roses are red.

It is not a poem.

It is simply
I love you.