Love Poems.

"The Designer seemed to have a collection of books of love poems. I asked what he liked about them, and he came over, looking very excited. He pulled out a book of Neruda.

‘I love Neruda!" I said, relieved that we’d now have a topic.

‘I haven’t read the book.’ He opened it to the frontispiece and showed me an inscription. ‘ I like the handwritten stuff, ‘ he said ‘You know, love stories that get donated to the Salvation Army’

Apparently the Designer would thumb through these books of secondhand poems, looking for inscriptions dedicating sonnets to people who were no longer adored. He liked that they’d been tossed out among the fondue makers, blenders and leftovers of marriages. He liked to think of love relegated to curbside pickup, put into cardboard boxes with old lingerie and cat scratching posts. It made him feel as though his own life was maybe not so dismal, as though other people gave their love away, as well, as though other people had not understood it’s value. Love poems. Inscriptions vowing forever. Just paper in the end. The Designer was replete with other peoples failures."

The Year of Yes by Maria Headley.

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