What It Felt Like To Love You

You were the closest thing I ever felt to home.
A welcome mat smile with a fireplace laugh,
Knowing I could collapse into you when the gravity of everything else
turned my bones to shackles.
When life held me down against my own will,
Shoved my face in gravel, gasps for breath between mouthfuls of dirt.
I could kick off my shoes and rest in you.
Rest in a place that I was always meant to be.
Because it was always supposed to be us.
At least, that’s what you told me.
And I never felt more safe than when I could look up at your constellations.
Slip off Orion’s Belt,
And you could slip into me.

Every song that’s ever given me tingles.
Every hug that reminded me why humans need to touch.
Every moonlit secret that traveled from my lips to yours.
Every broken promise to myself.
Every sleepless night trying to figure out when the path to your door became so hard to find.
Every misguided attempt to cling to us at eighteen.

Like driving together off a cliff at dusk.
We knew it couldn’t end well, but god damn,
what a view.
That’s what it felt like to love you.