Love Like Poetry
If there was one thing our love story lacked, it was drama. The day we met, the sun wasn’t scorching. It was just perfect. There was no wind, no cloudy skies, no rain. I wasn’t having a bad day, neither was he. We didn’t meet accidentally. It wasn’t also a blind date. Earlier, we had agreed to meet that day at a cafeteria near the school gate.
He wore a black long-sleeved shirt and dark-colored jeans while I wore a floral gown. There was no color coordination of any sort. He ordered for amala and ewedu, I ordered for firewood Jollof and salad, the kind that reminded me of the kankankan of my mother’s pot.
We talked like we had known each other for years. I pointed out that some soup had dropped on his shirt, he pointed out that I had some beef stuck in my teeth, and we laughed. He didn’t walk me to my bus stop as he had an impromptu test.
Later that night, he did not tell me that I was the first lady he had ever had a date with. He told me that he has had two failed love stories. I did not say to him that he looked like he walked out of my dreams. I told him I was tired of bringing down my walls in vain. Then he asked me to try one last time, and that was it. No roses, no candlelit dinner, no epistles, one sentence, and a promise of a life sentenced to soft love.
I remember I orchestrated a fight one time, but he didn’t let it drag. He looked me in the face and said he loved me too much to let something “minor” come in between us and apologized. Even I didn’t know what he was apologizing for, and so I ran to my friend in tears telling her how boring he was, we were, and she said, “Ralia, don’t mistake peace for boredom.”
I cried that we wouldn’t have any stories for our children, and she said the best of stories we can ever give to our children are the ones they would tell to theirs because of the love they saw us share. It made no sense and a lot of sense.
It also made me realize I didn’t want only a happy ending. I wanted a peaceful beginning and a happy storyline. It made me see that I didn’t like the drama. I wanted a soft love, one whose thoughts sang lullabies in my head, one that made my heart (and tummy full), one that was gentle, thoughtful, and melodious like poetry.
Lucky for you, and me, that’s precisely the kind of love (we) have.
