Cupid’s Folly

Poetry

Her parents named her Love as a joke between them,

something they whispered to each other on the nights

when they were just too high to care either way,

when loving each other went against all the odds.

The joke was on them that they ended up divorced

and remarried, the step-parents to other kids,

while Love tried to pick up the pieces of a home

that had fallen apart, regrouped, and stuck together

all without having anything to do with her at all.

By the time she was old enough to live on her own,

Love packed her few belongings from between

the two homes that had never really accepted her

and crossed an ocean (or two) just to get away.

London was too expensive while Paris was overrated,

but her heart found a niche (a hope) in Amsterdam

where she could play at her namesake and never

have to apologize for being too much or too little.

But Love had a reckoning with herself

when the men came too close or too fast