I didn't choose you
But how could I ever lose you
How could I know what
it feels like to break so
completely in front of
and in service of another
not once but daily and
constantly and always for
some silly little concern that
would rarely matter if it didn't
mean you might smile once,
that you might do a jig in the
kitchen and across the floor
with some expression suited
to a happiness that maybe I
had bought, or at least seen
in the store window and thought
to own or possess or give away,
if only to make some night slip
by with you in my arms and a
whole world away in the stars.

I didn't choose this life,
But it isn't in this happy that I saw strife,
I know I hated you some nights,
on the verge of complete fatigue,
seeing you and holding you and
saying to you words I had never said before
because I had never had to.
But needing to mean the words because
to mean them meant the difference
between living and dying, or at least
that's what I thought all those sleepless
nights with your head on my shoulder
and a whole lifetime to give you, lend you,
shape you and hopefully never break you.
I didn't say anything because I thought it
was true but because I needed it to be true.
What do I say?
I didn't know you yet too well,
nor did I know what you should hear,
or even what I should have heard
when I was hoping to be shaped and
made a life and love out of.
What do you say to make sure
that they are going to be OK?

I didn't think I'd want you,
And I didn't think I'd have to,
but I do.
You look upon my shoulder,
eyes blue,
and I'm so occupied in your gaze
as to never do another thing that
didn't mean saying your name not
out of frustration but need, and hope.
Because I have so many things I want for you.
I know it takes time and I will have to wait the
days and years of your life against mine, as if
growing reciprocally or in some manner of paradox.
But I want them now because you are so beautiful
now, I can only hope life is some manner of kind.

What if you hate me and move away?
What if I hate you and you always stay?
The words sound strange but only because
I had never said them to myself or because
they had never been said to me.
I try in some might of will that may shape
or break to give you the world
and I hope you never have to see
the latter.
You deserve better.
But so did I and I turned out fine.

I didn't buy that jig across the kitchen floor
but I saw you dance anyhow and you were
so beautiful in the porch light of some Autumn night,
laughing and smiling as if nothing had ever
been seen or done with so much abandon.
I danced too and the way you saw me was
a whole world that I had never known before,
one so warm and so insular, so just like this,
that maybe sometimes I hope, or pray, too much
that such moments can be bought, on sale.
But maybe I can just sit and hold you and tell
you the words that I had since been convinced
of long ago to let you know that I wanted to move
to the music too. Don't ever tell me it stops.

It doesn't. I danced some manner last night when
I saw you smile up at the ceiling, sleeping but
always alert to the life you are about to wake up to find.
I hope I can always give you this. I hope you smile.
I hope you dance. I hope you wanted me, maybe, even
if you didn't choose me nor will you lose me.

I heard the music last night
and saw myself doing a jig
in the kitchen as a boy with
a whole life ready to seize me,
or for me to seize it, something,
anything.

I know I didn't choose you
but, in those funny nights in
the kitchen, the porch, the night air,
I know I wanted you. Or maybe even loved you.
I didn't think I could say the words to a someone who
I was only getting, at once, to know, who might not
even be someone yet to know.
I hadn't said the words before but that didn't make them untrue.
Because I would choose you. Because I love you.
My dancer.
My child.