A Butterfly Breathing Out Of You Poem by Lidia Running

when I do not talk, I write like this:
in long untidy sentences with no punctuation or stopping or real grammar
and they say nothing but mystically enticing vocabulary that means nothing in context
but out of context is just the most beautiful thing on two pinpricks

when I do not talk i am waiting for you to call me
and when you call me I will not say hello, but I will purr into the phone
and you will know I have answered even through the mechanical distortion
and then you will say what I want to hear, which is I love you.

I love you
I love you
I love you, too

and then we will find new ways to say it
like Daisy in The Great Gatsby
that book I almost like now
(shh that's a secret)

and I will yell at you for buying me things
this means I love you.

and I will say that all my poetry fails to compare to you
this means I love you, too.

when we are kissing and we stop kissing
and I like to stare at you
that means I am about to smile
and when I smile you smile too
and I wonder what I did to get this lucky

dear Joey,

you are terribly more patient than I am, because I like to think ahead
and give you Christmas presents early
and wonder what I would do if you asked me to marry you right now
and then realize I know that I would say yes
and I would throw myself at you bodily
and knock you back onto the bed
and I would be happy forever even though people tell me this is impossible.

sometimes I wonder where all this is going
and I realize that it doesn't really matter
because I live for not talking until you call me
and I live for writing to you even if you never see it
and I will sit here thinking of new ways to say I love you.