Poetry

"Marry me"
"I can't"
"Yes you can. You love me, don't you?"
"Yes, but I love him also"
"Not the way you love me. I can tell"
"How?"
"It's in the way you look at me,
the way you touch me,
and the way you relax completely when you lay against me"
"I do the same with him"
"No, you don't,
not really"
A pause, a beating of two hearts.
"Marry me"
She turns away from him and swallows.
"No"
And with that, she left him standing in the doorway,
left to wonder why.

A week passed,
and then a month.
She would call,
they would talk.
"I miss you"
"Yeah? I miss you too" he says.
A pause, someone holds their breath.
"I'm marrying him"
A sigh.
"When?"
"This Thursday, at noon. St. Mary's Cathedral"
Another pause, but longer this time.
"Will you come?"
A sardonic laugh on the other line.
"Why would I do that?
Why would I put myself through that hell?
The hell of seeing the woman I love,
being married to another man?"
"I suppose you're right"
He sighs, then speaks.
"Yes, I'll come"
"You will?"
A pleading hope laces her words.
"Maybe, I'll think about it"
"Okay"
A pause,
"I have to go now."
"Okay, good-bye"
"Yeah, bye"
He hangs up,
she listens to the dial tone for a minute before hanging up too.

Thursday comes,
they're at the altar
but he's not there.
She already looked through the crowd.
Her heart falls a little
and she gets a strange ache behind her breast bone.
They say their vows,
then the priest speaks.
"Are there any here who would object to the union
of these two people?
Speak now or forever hold your peace"
    *          *        *
He looks at the clock,
it's a little past one.
She's married now,
he thinks to himself.
He gets up out of his chair
and grabs his keys,
then heads for the door.
     *      *      *

The door opens,
he looks on in disbelief.
She stands there,
panting and holding her white dress.
"It was always you.
I love you,
and I want to marry you,
not him.
Because it's you I love,
not him.
When I close my eyes to go to sleep,
it's you that I see,
and when I breathe,
it is you that I'm breathing in.
Not him.
It was always supposed to be you"