Literary Romantic Relationships

Ever have those moments when you’re in a crowded room with your back exposed. You can almost hear your blood stiffening against the warm tenderness of your right shoulder blade. The next sound you’ll hear is your body reverberating and then pain. Because that’s your dominant arm and you do everything with it.

Perhaps not the most pleasant image, and perhaps not quite romantic or literary romantic for your tastes either. As a poet, I believe all literary folks seek a romance that runs congruently with what our predecessor writers went on great lengths to describe: romanticism.

That’s not to say that some literary folk won’t do with a turn around, touch your toes, and shake it out type of quick relationship. Hey, they may even be into quicker hook-up types…the shake-n-bake of relationships. Not everyone wants to date that language apprentice who sighs and caves into a fog as the feelings, bodies, spirits meld.

Literary types may not be completely antique in demanding a recitation of Byron through 60 characters. It could be a totally bastardization of the poem. The more I break it down in text, the more absurd the idea becomes. “She walks in beauty, like the night /
Of cloudless climes and starry s” the first text would read. But, somehow if someone laboriously texted the poem to me, line by line. I’d definitely be flattered.

Literary romantic relationships could also be a total death trap for two creatives. Arguments over toilet paper, dishes, and trash will escalate into sestinas  about punctuation in poetry and whether to include punctuation in line breaks. On its own, the literary arguments would have qualms over proper speech spacing after line breaks of a poem.

Arguments in free verse would,

not necessarily draw attention to

ill formats but

reinforce that rules are meant to be broken.

And curfews. Not all relationships stagger along the constraints of time, but the daunting two-part question of “Where were you last night? Why are you now home smelling of every liquor at the bar?” Loses all sense of reason as it’s a given that literary folks don’t know that time exists. They confuse the numbers on the clock with lines, sentences, and other realms. Of course, as the hour draws nearer to four o’clock perhaps a drink or two would help the pen for some. Every even hour deserves a double shot. After midnight the drinks don’t even have names.

But in these relationships every sunset could be a newfound kingdom. Or the greeting of dawn through ink soaked pages could be a daring declaration of love. Surely everyone can agree that it’s the best feeling in the world when your other half is your number one fan and muse. Even if sometimes this other half of your soul tears apart every image until nothing can resemble a cliche.

The best part about being in a literary romantic relationship is that you’ll have poetry, writing, and art to talk about at all times. What’s for breakfast becomes a silky egg scramble with a slice of Ezra. Dinner a picnic and a bottle of Don Quixote. Dessert, what more than Pablo Neruda. And when the evening wanes into holding hands and sharing kisses. And when the bodies dance, most times one caresses the other. One holds on to the other.

For a brief moment breathing becomes harmonious. And as the bodies lay together one will recount their creative day. The other will lay their ear closer to catch every word. The dreams of the Great American Novel plays through the afterglow filled room. Grandeurs of the next word trend will lay curled at the foot of the bed. Feelings displayed through. Bodies joined together. Creative spirit takes flight for the literary romantics.

Sopphey Vance the poet, yarn artist, and legend resides in South Texas where he battles dragons and unicorns for Five 2 One Magazine.