On Neruda

You asked me why Neruda shall stop loving her

                      little by little,

                      if she, 

                      little by little,

                               stopped loving him. 

We deemed poor Pablo just another casualty of unrequited love and left him to love her in the rest of his poems. 

And as you,

        little by little, 

         stopped loving me. 

I,

little by little, understood what Neruda had to say.

Loving you rendered Poetry a slow and wholly painful experience. 

Because I loved you and sometimes, 

                                     only sometimes, 

                                      you loved me too.

Why couldn't you love me always.. 

And when he wrote the saddest poem of all, 

                    that night,

                                     I could feel his pain puncture my heart

                                  and I understood that Poetry is vandalism.

Because she broke Neruda's heart and the hearts of the already broken-hearted who read his saddest lines and loved what they do not have. 

And I started to write the saddest lines myself, because that was the only way I knew of that would let me keep you. 

So I kept you in lines like:

If time were to stop

this very second

and earth did not

chase itself around

Only then will

I replace

all the yous

in my poems

and leave the Is 

to stand tall

and alone

and I would

finally

stop 

needing

you.

Just as Neruda kept her for him and you for me and

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.

I love you straightforwardly.
I love you because

I know no other way than

this: where I does not

exist

nor you.

You may have forgotten me but
I have not stopped looking for you
because I have not yet
stopped loving you,
little by little.