By Rachel Brook
quite a pair
but both paired already
we’d be friends—
with beautiful, bountiful benefits—
but not more
you wanted consideration and care
yet with love at home your line was firmly drawn—
you didn’t want (for) any more
long before I loved you I feared it.
I made love my mortal enemy—
the death-knell of casual—
taboo, off limits, not allowed
I told myself I couldn’t
shouldn’t
wouldn’t
as I grew toward loving you
countless songs called out my fear
and the feelings coming into bloom
but I put the pin back in the grenade
I felt the possibility blossoming
and I thought my love not a flower
but a weed to be stamped out.
once I loved you and knew it would hold fast like bindweed
I grew again, toward acceptance
yet still I buried those ripening petals
thinking they would never be matched
and that I need not ever show you—
what if I loved you and never said it
but within you a tender shoot was growing too
and you were brave enough to let me see
love found both of us, again, and you dared speak its name
in that moment I was a vine wrapped tight around you
and finally, I allowed my feelings to grow roots, bed in, and bud like spring
now that I love you without hindrance or hesitation
I find it sad I ever tried to squash it down
now we tend this garden together
still sometimes afraid
yet season by season each waters the other
and yes,
I would do anything to extend the life of this rose
Rachel “Rach” Brook (she/they) is an award-winning writer of personal essays, poetry, and marketing copy, based in London, U.K. You can find their work in the City Lit anthology Between the Lines, Penstricken, Thorn & Bloom Magazine, and on Substack (@rachbwrites).