Do you love me?

It’s half past 2 at night,

The room is partially lit with that overheated table lamp,

It’s comfortably warm, like bathing in steam milk.

 

It is then when it happened.

You looked at me … not just with that brief recognizing glance.. No …

You looked At me

Reaching through my pupils right into my heart…

Deliberately, with a meaning, as if you are about to announce the deepest secret of yours.

 

I knew right then it’s about to happen…

The air will break in pieces, and the time will freeze indefinitely…

As you whisper the seacrest question that can be asked …

Do you love me?

 

The few most quietest seconds I ever lived through emerged between us,

As you breathed heavily awaiting for the most important answer,

As I shivered from the electrified vibrance of your voice..

 

To ask “Do you love me?” – is an act of courage, a confession..

As if standing all nude and exposed among a crowd of judging strangers,

It is the most vulnerable state anyone can find themselves in.

 

It is the question with which amidst all the preaching of individualism,

The long path of liberation away from chains of dependence,

You declare you need my heart to accept yours.

 

“Do you love me?” are the words of holly ritual

Of you handling yourself over to me.

 

“Do you love me?” is the manifestation of the need for unity,

In the absence of social acclamations.

 

It is a request for responsibility

Over the words you can’t spill in abundance.

 

“Do you love me?” really asks if I have known love

In order to perform it.

 

It asks if I am capable  of loving someone over myself,

And not just for my convenience or self-interest,

But if I’m ready to make you my world,

To breathe with your air, to eat with your mouth, to see with your eye.

 

“Do you love me?” asks if I love all of you,

Even when you are not around,

Even when you are always around.

 

It asks if I am mature enough to handle

Your demons fighting mines,

Of us advancing from strangers to partners.

 

It is a declaration that you are ready to wear my love

Like a veteran wears his victory,

That your song is ready to be sang in duet.

 

This simple 4-word grammatical complexion

Embraces the most complex feelings of human existence

And calls grammatically simpler, but yet much deeper 2-word – “I do”.

 

© Elena Sergienko