Unrequited love is an indigo bunting, those black birds
of spring, each with a scrap of sky fastened to its wings. 
At Lincoln Junior High School, I followed a boy around 
 
the outdoor track, smelled roses when crab apple petals 
stormed the third leg of the mile. I was lost and adrift
in wild bliss until the thunk of his foot catching a high hurtle 
 
tasted like sawdust in my mouth. When Ty was placed 
in my group in English class I synced my stride with his
and pretended to be Walter Mitty’s wife for laughs. Ty 
 
knew I was a spaz-in-love even before he dared me to slice 
his finger in the jaws of the art room paper cutter. My blade-
mouth whistled The Ride of the Valkyries, spattering red
 
jeweled drops all over love-city. But Ty said It’s ok, be cool
as he held his hand-mirror to my face and I saw geraniums 
wilt and shrink blood-dark in fall. I’ll pick up some charcoal
 
and draw my self-portrait for the next forty years—toothed 
ice caves, crisp violets, and razor-blue wings. Even Shiva 
at the piano. To my Love I say Je ne suis rien sans toi
 
by which I mean the nothing of your love made me something,
became a habit, never stale. An absent love inspires blizzards 
of poems and the blue sky to adorn spring’s black-winged birds.