Hymn to All the Men I’ll Never Love by Julia Copus

Someone should knock me out, but not before saying that romance novels are unhealthy and should not be used as a last defense to keep the heart from breaking. I should stop crying for people who don’t even exist, and just cry for what is and what happened and be done with it.

Hymn to All the Men I’ll Never Love
Julia Copus

My heart, sing praises to the men
I’ll never love; from whom a night
away’s just that — a night — and not
a lifetime in the desert without food
and water. It’s because of them
that breakfasts can be eaten, Lord, appointments
kept, and letters left to lie
where they have fallen; men with whom
a perfect evening may be nothing more
than beer and cards outside beneath the lean-to
where straight-talk and easy gestures leave
dark nests of sparrows and the scent
of bonfires in their wake; the sort of men
whose smiles I can endure without
surrendering my all to them;
in whose unswerving disregard,
let heaven rejoice, let the earth be glad.