Is It Because You Love Fall?

I can’t help
but think that timing has everything
to do with what happens
in this life.

What if your parents
hadn’t moved north before
you were born? What if
they hadn’t sold the house
they built in the neighborhood
where my mother raised me?
Would you have thrown snowballs at me
on days they cancelled class
at what would have been
our elementary school?
Would you have been the boy
next door who I rejected
when he asked me to the prom?

We’ve been friends
for three years and I’ve loved
you for at least two.
You’ve loved me back, now,
for several months,
and you’ve let me see you
without your hat
for thirty nine days.

Why now? Why are we
waking up together now instead
of six months ago or six months
from now?
Is it because you love fall?
You told me of your admiration
the other day with arms
around each other. Yours draped
across my shoulders and mine wrapped
around your waist. We walked
around North Hero on streets
decorated with dead leaves and bright
un-carved pumpkins.
We noticed all the gorgeous dogs—
Boxers, Pit Bulls, and a Great Dane
who licked a toddler’s face.
Children bundled
in one piece fleece suits,
strawberry hats, and mittens
rolled in piles of leaves.
You kissed
my chilly forehead.

You left me
in my bed one Sunday night.
You had to work and my classes
were canceled
for Columbus Day the following morning.
“I won’t be able to leave you
in this bed tomorrow morning,
if I stay,” you said.
So I watched a girly movie
and had to write you
a letter because I can’t help
but see the reflection
of our relationship
in a movie like P.S. I Love You.

I find it ironic
and it makes me burn
that as this season you love dies for the year
and winter is born again,
I am leaving.
I ask myself,
why will I have
to read
this poem to people
drinking
pints of Guinness in a pub
in Dublin
who have never seen you
And never will?