My partner and I agreed on no valentine's day. nothing.
he said:
we're not going to do that, are we?
and surprised, knowing he performed such rites for less cynical lovers, I respond:
oh, of course not! no way!
Neither of us would be caught dead appearing an inch more romantic than the other.
There are so many other places in need of energy besides each other.
I say to my parents proudly, when asked:
oh, we don't do, valentine's day.
The red envelope of their hallmark card responds:
WE do valentines day!
Yet another way you are linking me to convention,
you are the lens through which they can see me as both whole and (thus) normal.
the avenue for, the wall to push against
my own right to delineate the markers of my adulthood
a site for pruning and shaping of these inherited values.
and yet, I am thinking about the collective wisdom that makes holidays.
most obvious in December:
we give ourselves the remembrance of goodwill, as the weather gets cold.
or November, we bolster bountifulness as the last greenery dies.
what about February makes us need love?
The enactment of this holiday, in fact most of them,
is so terrible that I cringe to admit the craving is true.
March doesn't give us much, in the world of printed cards.
But in my life it's a big one, the month for Optimism.
As a kid, we'd get the last two weeks off for break.
and the first week is my birthday.
Break now replaced with your birthday
and, this year
the day we celebrate
that we have been choosing to do this thing together for two years.
and yet you choose to, in my weakest moments, witnessing me frantic and collapsed
The everyday of you taking this on is that saying yes.
The exact affirmation for these slowly lengthening days.
