I’ll tell you right now

I don’t know Spanish.

Un poco solamente.

Only a little,

Two years ago I got ordained as a joke.

Next, I officiated a wedding

in Spanish.

The entire ceremony

in Spanish.

More than un poco.

Moments before,

the bride has offered me a shot of patron

I hesitated before turning it down

I can barely roll my r’s as is.

Rrrrrrr.

I wore my moms preaching robe.

I stood at the front of the room,

Reading the vows outloud.

Repeten con migo.

Repeat after me..

In the back of the room

was my partner

He tried not to laugh

I made eye contact with him

Only for a moment.

I couldn’t blow my cover.

I didn’t want him to either.

That night I imagined what I’d want to say

In a room full of witnesses

Who knew me too well

To expect me to stand in a wedding dress

Without laughing too hard

For my own good.

I think when the day comes

I’ll tell you,

Tell them,

myself even;

Thank you.

Thank you to this love,

This wild absurd world.

I promise to love you

No matter how many times

You blow my cover.

I dont have it together,

Un poco solamente.

Somedays, I think.

I promise to remember the time you got stung by a jellyfish.

I threw a fit because you wouldn’t let me pee on you.

On the way to the beach,

I asked if you believed

the earth was flat.

You pulled the car over.

Looked me dead in the eyes and said,

“Do you believe it is?”

So what if I do, would you love me.

“Yes, but we’d go to counseling.

You’d go to a science class.”

The air smelled of saltwater.

I promise to tell our grandkids

I once plucked a hair

From the top of your foot

You almost cried.

I caught you googling,

“How to deal with grief.”

You told me,

I dont deal with grief.

Not well.

Not even a little bit…

Un poco.

On the day of my friends death

We fucked in our first apartment.

I pointed to the sky and whispered

This one’s for you.

You shook your head.

There was no cover on us to blow.

Only you.

I wont tell our grandkids that part.

You get it,

Me, that is.

In all my scatterbrained ways,

You’ve learned what to expect.

Loved me anyways.

When I stomp upstairs after a fight,

Tell you “you’re supposed to follow me.”

“You’re supposed to apologize.”

You do, you always do.

Even when it’s not your sorry to give

Even when we both know

you’re not supposed to.

I’d only learned to give

what I believed to be someone else’s…

all the parts of me,

As if they belonged to anyone else.

You gave them all back.

Exposed, uncovered.

You knew there were wounds.

You didn’t ask me to close them.

Only to open this heart a little more,

Knowing it might hurt.

Knowing it probably will.

And hoping all along its worth it.

It’s worth it.

I’ll tell the whole room

All these witnesses

that this scares me.

This love thing.

This wild absurd world.

Flat or not.

This open heart,

That opens a little further.

Un poco.

For You…

you.

Thank you.

For Always,

Always Blowing my cover.