When you tell me you love me for the very first time 

Promise me you won’t say it during a sunset 

When the colors smear across the sky 

Promise you won’t whisper it

While we’re looking up at the stars, immersed in the silence of the night

Promise me you won’t say it on my birthday 

Or when we dance in the school’s brightly lit gym, music thrumming over the speakers 

When you tell me you love me

Make it mundane, make it simple

Like we’ve been saying it all our lives 

Because when you stop saying it 

I do not want to be reminded of you

When I see a painted sunset 

Or when the stars twinkle above me

Or when I turn on music 

Please, do not eclipse my life with your love 

And then, with the absence of it.