patchouli

This afternoon on my subway commute I noticed a couple, in their mid twenties – she was beautiful in an ethereal, slightly gothic, huge turquoise blue pools of Caribbean ocean water eyes, fair rosy cheeked with a sprinkling of freckles on each cheek kind of way – her hair was wild, curly and unkempt, dark brown; she wore knee long black leather flat heeled boots with buckles up each side, skinny black jeans, a hip length corduroy blazer, chic red retro eyeglasses that kept slipping to the tip of her nose, then back in place, and I’m fairly certain she smelled of patchouli.

I wasn’t close enough to know for sure, but I could just tell

He was a startling contrast – about thirty pounds overweight, long brown curly hair pushed behind his ears to keep the unwashed strands off his swollen face, pasty white hairless thick non muscular calves peeking out from the bottom of his off white cargo shorts… black t-shirt with some nondescript band name emblazoned across the front, the neckband stretched out from being worn too much…

But the contrast ended there.

They both wore thick platinum wedding bands on their left hands, and their interaction was of two brand new lovers, freshly pressed newlyweds who had only moments before stepped out of his cousin’s 1983 silver Honda civic (complete with soda cans tied to strings on the back bumper and “just married” in white spray paint all over the windows)…

Yet there was something “old” about the newness of their love…

The way he had his hands tangled in her hair and the way she nuzzled up to him without complaining about his hands being tangled in her hair… the way their arms were intertwined as they sat side by side, like they were trying in every way possible to get closer to each other, inside of each other…

The way she looked up at him as he spoke to her, how their laughter, as though on cue, rose and fell together, ending in a longing look into each other’s eyes, her right hand tracing the contours of his chin …

The way he spontaneously wrapped her up into his arms and held her tightly to him…

I found myself watching but trying not to be caught watching… 

All buttoned up in my black wool pea coat and sensible shoes, laptop bag at my feet, keys and wallet in hand, my eyes welling up with tears that refused to fall…

And I wondered…

Where was my love like that.

Where was my longing look,

my I love everything about you

my you’re so difficult, so complicated, so easy to get along with, so perfect, i-would-do-anything-to-get-closer-to-you-even-after-you-let-me-all-the-way-in

love like that

perhaps I missed it…

perhaps it isn’t in the cards for me

perhaps

I have it already

And I don’t even know

Perhaps I never will

jmr / 2010