🖤 I Loved Many Men Except For You 🖤 Poem by James McLain

Hope,
You were the first one, elusive as a river slipping to the sea.

Many men have touched the surface of my heart, but never as you—never wholly.

I have loved women too, not in the same form or flame, but with the quiet comfort of knowing.

Perhaps I was drawn to their softness, their strength, like the sea calls the rivers home.

It is not bodies I've sought, but the soul's reflection, and you, hope, were never truly mine.