Wesley Upchurch, Love Keeps

Love never truly ends, does it? Even when we take it from the windowsill and hide it in a cupboard. Even when we drown it, even when it hurts.

Love keeps for a long time, Like the open jar of salsa in the back of the fridge that’s still good. How on earth is it still good?

I would’ve written us as a romantic story if we were one. I would’ve have written us as a bloody nonfiction about a battle no one remembers anymore if we were one.

I’d have written us in any other way. We are a poem about a ship that was encased in ice but is still able to float. We are a book about what love looks like when it’s frozen but not dead.

Love learns to breathe underwater. Love is not a selfless thing, I suppose. It’s not kind, it’s not patient.

It’s desperate and grabbing, It’s not standing stoic on the shore as their boat disappears into the sunset —

Love is swallowing the entire ocean For just one more Kiss.

I know the path by instinct even though I haven’t traveled it before. Left coming up, right after that. The curtain of trees surrounding the entrance — roots, rocks, branches,

Nothing compared to the walls they once locked me behind. I have conquered stronger than rocks before. Steps come easier, the universe encouraging me onward.

Somewhere, years away, a small child reads Our story and smiles. They believe in forever!

I don’t need to know where they are To know how to get To them.