My parents were married at a courthouse.
I’m not sure if there was even a dress,
or a suit, I don’t think any family
attended. By all accounts, it was a
perfunctory affair. They never talked
to me about dating. Or sex.

No one has
ever taught me about these aspects of
relating to other humans in a romantic
way, so my knowledge base is primarily
middle school sex ed delivered in a
Midwestern classroom, paired with tropes
from all the PG and PG-13 rom coms
I borrowed on VHS at my local library.

I
feel
damaged,
like a bird
with a broken wing:
I can still hop around,
but I can’t fly.

The thing I want most in this world
is for someone to see the full brilliance
of my entire being, to see the brilliance
and the scars, and the parts that scare me,
to see all of that and say,
“That’s my person.
That’s who I want to wake up to every morning.
That’s who I want to whisper all my hopes and
fears to, that’s who I want to pack a lunch for
and hold hands with and tell them,

‘You are exactly who you were meant to be
and I will love you just as you are
until my lungs can no longer take
another breath.’”

I clutch this dream of my someone tightly,
hiding it under my pillow at night.

Someday, I keep telling myself.

Someday, they will find me.