No one prepared me for this.

It was instant. I was lost. This was real love. Inescapable, can’t breathe, heart pounding, all consuming love.

It wrapped it’s roots around my left ventricle and sprouted forth, bursting, squeezing, crushing my heart into an irreparable pulpy mess. I was done for at first sight. Twisted around a little finger with no hope of rescue (not that I’d have taken it anyway).

Willing to drop everything, everyone, anytime—just to hear you sigh.

Feel your gentle soft caress on my cheek, light as sheer silk brushing my electric skin.

Your every glance making my bruised heart pound against the cage of ribs imprisoning it, preventing it from joining and melting into yours.

The sound of your rhythmic breath as you sleep, pressed against my chest—lost in nostalgic dreams of the extremely recent past; a lullaby to my very soul.

I find myself drunk on your intoxicating scent. It lingers on my pillow and dresses my skin in the lightest marking of your love (that only I know is there).

Someone should have warned me about this. Falling so deep, so instantaneously, can’t be good for one’s self. Nor when forced to listen to your echoing cries of confusion and pain. To stand idle unsure of how to help—-if you’d even let me anyway. Fighting against demons I can not see nor understand.

I have succumbed to your every whim and bear your love like a badge of war. Sleepless nights mark my face, my tangled hair hangs free and loose from your last touch. My cheekbones become pronounced (like cliffs waiting for erratic tears to throw themselves off of), as dining on food becomes secondary to the feast of your smile.

My hunger. Neediness. You are now my sustenance.

When you are away from me I am distant. A thick gray cloud descends as salty raindrops trace my cheek, following invisible trails from your fingers, until your return. Heralded in like a spring thunderstorm by the frantic pounding of my heart’s ecstatic flight against my chest.

Everything else fades away—unsaturated, muted, dull.

Even if someone would have warned me of this all consuming beast—even if I scoffed and bragged of my willpower, I know I would have still drown in you.

Happily exhaling my last breath into your being.