had it backwards—true love
has never
made anything happen,
it utterly refuses
to conquer.
Love does not
do work, it only
takes credit.
It's the jealous frozen
lusty moon;
not the incandescent
sun that lights it.
Love doesn't permit things
or divulge its long-term plans;
in practice, the real thing
is more like a temporary, willful,
and difficult withholding
of apathy,
of prejudice,
of revenge.
Only, love is
lazier than that—
it's never cleared
a forest
of formidable oak trees;
it's more like the little breeze
that likes to go out gossiping
in the grass of empty meadows,
it's never held a job, never
plugged in a vacuum never turned
anyone's car into a Subaru.
Love is the bliss-
fully indiscriminate consumer.
It's never satisfied; it can't
be filled up.
And even though
we can feel it sometimes sloshing
around inside of us—it's all
diet coke and zebra cakes
and chocolate milk
and jolly ranchers:
it takes up some space, but it's worth less
than it cost, and it
just makes us hungrier.
