Love Story

By: Cameron Pien

This poem is part of the Claritas fall 2024 issue, Margins. Read the full print release here.

Draft No. 1

I was sixteen and searching for salvation. 

He was a hero inhabiting high school halls, 

And I yearned to be the one he rescued from loneliness. 

I wanted to write an enchanting romance,  

So I sketched our silhouettes on the cover page 

And painted them with swirls of rose-colored daydreams. 

Edit No. 1

His arms around her at the school dance–

Draft No. 2

I was eighteen and searching for novelty. 

He was a movie star with effortless humor,

And I sat spellbound in a front row seat. 

I wanted to immortalize the cadence of his voice, 

So I scrawled his name in my script, made him my muse, 

And believed my fantasy was transmuting into reality. 

Edit No. 2

His hand on her back guiding her into the restaurant–

Writer’s Block

I long to star in the narrative, yet here I am…

Shoved from the storyline to the sidelines again. 

During murky, interminable nights my insecurities 

Slither around my mirror and across my mind,  

Shrieking that I deserve the entirety of the blame 

For failing to be smarter and prettier and more like her. 

As the cacophony claws at my eardrums, 

I frantically scribble unintelligible paragraphs, 

Constructing towers of tattered, tear-stained notebooks, 

Believing that if I compose enough alternate endings, 

One of them will come true. 

Yet I question the worth of my words, 

Because no novel of beseeching soliloquies 

Will rewrite reality so that he’ll notice me. 

My hands and heart reach exhaustion, I drop my pen…

A New Story

The Author of the universe pries the sheaf 

Of self-pitying stories from my hands. 

He opens another book, of which He is the writer and protagonist, 

And begins to read me the greatest love story in existence. 

I hear that the love I desperately seek

Is not found in human heroes or mortal muses

But in a man who stretched out His arms on a cross, 

His sacrifice a more priceless gift than any diamond ring. 

His glory covers every chapter of history, for He is the only worthy hero. 

Yet He approaches me, slumped among the crumpled scraps

Of my attempts to write my own story instead of embracing His, 

And although my fingers are stained and spattered with corrosive ink, 

He takes my hands and promises to purify me. 

I am struck speechless as He invites me to step 

Out of the desolate borders and into His narrative. 

As I inhabit the role that He has written for me, 

I am cradled by the lines of His perfect love story. 

Every sentence brings sanctification, 

Every paragraph brings peace. 

He is the beginning and the end, 

And I will walk in His words for eternity.