Sonnet #1: Bekah Hinrichs

Long, long before when I was youth,

Little knowing and brighter eyed,

Ignorant of the ways and of the truth,

Of six years I was when I spied

You sitting with your firm demeanor,

So long ago it seems unreal,

Yet real I know it is, all the keener

Now I know, with shadowed pangs I feel

The way you spoke and the way you moved,

And for my young naive love

You cared but little and soon did prove

That no matter how hard one prays to God above

There is no thing that can sway the heart,

Lest it tries to sway itself at least in part.

On Bekah:

Then

I was young and foolish and six years old. One would not think that love could breed in such a young man, that true love, or some feeling that resembles the kind of mature love that one feels as they grow into an age where relationships are common possibly could. But it did. In fact that love I felt so many years ago was far more mature and true than anything I’ve ever felt since. I devoted my life to persistently trying to knock down the barriers and ask her to spend a little time with me….but never. I was a dork, big glasses, big head, ugly hair and gigantic smile. I knew all the answers and I was picked on all the time….there was not a single moment’s ray of popularity or enjoyability about my young school life. And she I had hoped would be the one to somehow pull me out.

No. She would not have it. Every time I tried she would turn me away and though I would hurt, I would suck it up and try again. I wouldn’t give in. I just wouldn’t. I knew damn well that she was beautiful and that I wanted to spend time with her. She was smart, strong, independent, and loved to act and was quite talented at it. Our interests were the same and our loves were, too. I was afraid to admit it because I thought she might think me just some sort of crazy stalker, but I had always loved Egypt and archeology…I loved everything she did and she wouldn’t give me the time of day.

It wasn’t enough for her thought to just turn me down time after time as I threw myself against her like a battering ram. No…she had to go further. In fourth grade I believe it was, or maybe fifth, she tricked me and tore out my heart. She pretended to like me…just for long enough to lure me out to the playground where she could ridicule me with her friends. Bitter, bitter, bitter memories of those days. Of a girl who I would have given the world to have and only tried to ruin me. They didn’t know any better, she didn’t know any better, I didn’t know any better….but that was no excuse.

I fought and I fought and I fought for years and years. God did I fight and never once did I give up…never once did I even take the beating and lie down for a moment. All I did was swear that the next day I would double my efforts…and the fact of the matter is I just never understood that women don’t like men who try. They like the men who treat them like dirt, the men who would turn them away in an instant if it was more convenient to do so. And so I fought until my freshmen year of high school. Eight years….eight years of my life wasted trying so hard to win someone who wouldn’t give me the time of day. She danced with me once in all those years….once and I remember it.

Now

Bekah. Hm. I don’t much think about her anymore. I never see her, I never talk to her, nor anyone else in my class for that matter anymore. No one. They’re all gone and I’m just fine with that.

The fact of the matter is she really did ruin me. Had I not met her I probably would have a great deal more of my romanticism. I proclaim to be a romantic, but I’m not nearly as romantic as I used to be or ever really had the chance to be because of that girl. And she ruined me so that I’m no longer willing to fight for years and years for a girl that I really believe to be worth fighting for. Now I just give up. Now I just turn and find someone easier to attain. And that is by far the most tragic thing that has ever happened in my life. But there’s nothing left in me. Too often I’ve fought and struggled and hoped and prayed and maybe had I not been done in by Bekah, maybe I could still con myself into fighting….but I already know the outcome of desire and love and conviction and persistence. Nothing.