I watch you laugh
Every dimple on your cheeks
Every crinkle underneath your eyes

Every giggle,
Every chuckle,
Every smile

I watch you listen
Every time you knit your eyebrows
Every time you pick at the underside of your nails

Every time you lower your head,
Every time you hold you breath
While I whisper “I love you”

I watch you shuffle,
Every time your feet pace
Across the living room

Every time your fingers
Weave through each other
Pretending they are my fingers

I watch your eyes
Every time they cross
Every time they lower

Every time they soften at my words
Every time they close through a flutter of eyelashes
For you to imagine that I am there with you

I watch you answer the telephone
Crossing your fingers that I am on the other line.
And sighing with relief when you hear my voice

I watch you grin as your voice bursts through the telephone
In a sudden surge of happiness and energy that only you have
I watch you twirl the telephone cord round and round your index finger

And I watch you hope that someday
Perhaps we will not need the telephone
To speak to each other.

And I watch your eyes gleam
As I promise that once we are together,
We will never need the telephone again.

That we will bury it in the attic
Along with old scrapbooks and baby teeth
And let it become completely covered in dust.