in love with love (getting with it)

She’s a romantic
She’s a [day] dreamer
Looks every eligible guy in the eye and becomes a believer
That he sees her and might be the keeper
To keep her,
in the next chapter she’s ever promised is the “happy end”–
or at least “a valuable life experience to have under one’s belt”.

She
talks the talk of the wants she wants to happen:
–of the “who?”, of the “what do he do, how he be actin’
when you
observe him with his friends?” See if he preached what he practice
“This is how to find him!” She keeps her mind open. Discerning. Determined.

She’s searching for “the one”.

Or more like a one
“Cuz its 2018* and the idea of ‘the one’ is old fashioned.”

But she is still single, and finds she’s dissatisfied with the still unfilled role of “lead actor”.
He hasn’t happened.

Her heart doesn’t skip beats with men she meets
It skips men.
From man to man to man oh man, again?
Like a skipping stone on a pond
In the quiet of dawn, after dawn, after dawn,
A new date, a new toss,
A pit-pit-pit-pit-pat–break,
another dip below the prance along the surface
No more walking on water.

“Are you in love with love?” she asks her reflection in the mirror
Eyes primed, shadowed, lined, mascara’d.
Eye brows shaped to drape those dressed windows-to-the-soul. And
Skin evened, contoured. Lips balmed, lined, tinted, glossed and dabbed.
Looks to grab
just one of those hims. So much work. Does she really want this?

“Are you in love with love?,” she asks her reflection in the bathroom mirror,
“Because the first 3 guys you ditched
and the one working at the gym didn’t meet prerequisites.
And for the last 2 you said it just ‘got too real’.
What more can a romantic ask for than a reality better than a dream?!
You never gave it a chance
How can you know he can’t dance if you don’t give him a chance?”

“Or, are you more afraid that you can’t?”

She can’t help but ask herself this question
as she sits on her couch,
watching “Love Actually” for the umpteenth time,
sipping her chai,
dismissing the images in her mind
from the musical grime of 107.9
where love and sex intertwine, redefined as one–and the exact same
where a romantic’s idea of love is a mistake of naïveté,
a “let’s be honest, its really an every-human-for-his-self-ish game,” this “love”
get with it
–where the “modern fairytale [has] no happy ending”**
expect pain with some gain, yet more pain than any gain ascertained

She can’t help but ask herself as she sits on her couch.
Is it me?
Am I afraid that I can’t dance?
Am I afraid of the risk that something wanted won’t stay, won’t stand?
That this really is a game?
Am I afraid that the dream might end?
Am I afraid that time will finally tell me there is no man?
Am I so in love with the idea of love that my faith has panned?
And that so long as this is true, real life–my discovery of real life, doesn’t stand a chance?

What if I try and my feet don’t dance?

 

 

 

*Originally written in 2014, sitting on a couch ;-). As a 2018 afterword: What if she tries, and they do?

**”The Heart Wants What it Wants” by Selena Gomez

Happy early Valentine’s Day  ❤

 

Copyright © 2018 A.M. Wilsonne