Love Poem for Self

Lauren Zuniga is one of my favorite poets right now.  I was going to write something tonight, but then I got caught up in trying to do something that could potentially be REALLY COOL tomorrow...but I can't get it to work for tonight.  So instead, I'm posting somebody else's poem (that I wish I had written).  Come back tomorrow.  There could be something REALLY COOL.

If you were to write a love poem for yourself...what would it sound like?  Would it read like this one?

Love Poem for Self -- Lauren Zuniga

There are a thousand blonde hairs on your arm
sprawled out like hippies on the lawn
lying on their side, waiting for new freckles to appear
like history in the sun, you shaved them once.
You didn’t like the furry halo they formed
around your chubby limbs. Like an announcement
that you were not made of gold clay like the other girls
in the seventh grade. It grew back with resentment.

There is a bump on your wrist, a souvenir of an accident.
Sometimes when it’s quiet, I like to kiss it because it
reminds me of women. A dainty hinge of forgiveness.
I won’t tell you how beautiful your hands are because
we know how much you hate them. How you curse their
dimpled stubs, but have you seen them move like language?
Have you seen them palm a phrase, hand it to the air around
a stage or serve as a runway for a kiss blow to a child’s face?
Hold them open. Let me love them.

Let me love your full moon belly. Thick trunk of growth rings
that recedes in and circles out, an earth song swelling.
You were marked as a life giver, so baby, stop referring
to yourself with names only fit for cattle on feedlots.
You are a labyrinth of miracles, explore this.

Make your way through the bends and angles to the
auburn nest. Part the hedge with your fingers.
Plant names like Home, Adore, Gratitude, Wonder,
watch them pulse with nourishment and burst
into a pleasure wilderness. Can you believe your
body can do this?

I want to map the stories, take them out of their case
and remind you of the whole scene. Like your jagged eyelid
and crooked brow that you despise so much. They took on
flying shards of glass to protect your iris. Your hips, spread
wide as wings, served as the opening for the two reasons
you wake up in the morning. And do you remember how soft
your hair felt against your neck as you put your finger down
your throat like a coat hanger, unlocked a thousand calories
of anger, heaved and trembled until there was nothing left.
Can you believe your body can hold that much regret?

Baby, stop trying to fold yourself up into a flattened perfume
picture of a girl. You are more 3D than these city streets.
You are parks, gutters and laughter. When everyone else
has gone away, when the applause has faded, watch how
the street lights reflect in the pavement . How the sounds
clash and move like progress. Let me love you.
Like only I know you. Let me love you. Like it would end
wars if I loved you hard enough. Let me love you like
we could heal the whole damn world, if you just knew
what you were worth.