How To Fall In Love, Truly

Fall in love with the depth of her eyes
but realize that oceans exist beyond
the expansion and contraction of her pupils,
that there is depth in the ridges
of your grandmother’s skin,
in the silver of her chain that holds
slivers of your ancestors’ claims.
There is depth in the soil beneath your feet
and in the footprints you leave; drink from
the wells of the earth and you will pour poetry.
Fall in love with the underlined sentences,
the words you highlight, the ones you mark in bold
because when everything else washes away,
you will still have your words to hold your world.

Fall in love with the smell of her skin
but remember to revel in the scents
of ink and paper, notice
how each letter is a repository
of feeling and breathe in the fragrances
of each word as you write.
Fall in love with the smell of butter
and warm waffles in a retro cafe,
how you can taste a different time
on a breakfast plate.
Fall in love with whiffs of childhood
in colouring books and pastel crayons,
how yellow smelled a little stronger
than blue to you and you grew up
on a strict dose of sunshine.

Fall in love with the sound of her voice,
the kind of mellowness that can only
come in honey bottles,
but also hear the buzzing of bees,
feel the patterns of sound in the air
as they build kingdoms on soft flowers
and measure the silences they leave,
put your thumb to your wrist and hear
the phenomenon of your heart beating.
Listen to raindrops create revolutions
at your step as you splash your way
through puddles to remind yourself
of being young enough, free enough.
Feel the music of the night sky
sieved through an array of stars
shiver against your arms
and hear yourself count aloud,
the numbers feel funny against your tongue
and the stars, too many. Always too many.

Fall in love with the touch of her lips
but remember that there are heavens
fuller than the perfection of a kiss,
that the breeze writes love letters
on your skin,
that the joy of holding a freshly plucked mango
in your palms is also infinite,
that the universe is a fabric
of many textures and you
must sample each.
Feel the warmth of a dog’s fur
against your skin; see, friendship
is as easy as this.
Feel the sweater your mother
knitted for you as a child of four,
and find yourself fall in love
with her even more.
Feel.

Fall in love with her, yes,
with her chocolate skin and sea green eyes,
with all of her body and soul
but remember that there are homes
other than her skin, that there are shelters
other than her eyes, that there is
an entire world for you to fall in love with

every day.