$ echo "A Minor Love"

"Once more Love stirs me up, the limb-loosener, a creature bitter-sweet, baffling."

- Sappho, Fragment 130

Your love's a mirage I can't seem to pursue.

Your love's a mirage I can't seem to subdue.

Perhaps life will show that I'm a mere fool,

But your love's a mirage I wish I knew.

A drunken message sent alongside friends

You'd known for just a little while;

A night of liquid pleasure made you

Express what you had held awhile.

My foolishness has left my heart

To wonder what you truly meant;

If all those words were yours to say,

Or merely words the wine had lent.

And so I keep those words unread,

Though I remember every line;

Afraid to learn they came from you,

Or that they came from wine.

I wonder if the heart can speak

More clearly when it's blurred,

Or whether drunken honesty

Is honesty absurd.

I miss the girl behind the glass,

Whose quiet voice could steal my ear;

Who'd sit across the chessboard from me,

And make the world seem rather near.

Perhaps I saw her broken parts

And thought that I could make them whole;

A foolish wish, perhaps, to mend

What never was mine to control.

A year has passed, and now I know

Your words were truly meant.

How cruel to learn their truth so late,

When all the chance was spent.

For once, perhaps, you might have been

The love I could pursue;

But time has taken what was there,

And left me wanting you.

Your love's a mirage I can't seem to pursue.

Your love's a mirage I can't seem to subdue.

Perhaps life will show that I'm a mere fool,

But your love's a mirage I wish I knew.