You lucky, lucky girl.

You have an apartment just your size.

A bathtub full of gin.

A heart the size of Alaska and a suitcase that can contain all your belongings before anyone connects the dots.

You lucky, lucky girl.

You have two legs, each like a tree

and a soul that lives in the hips.

When the hips sway sideways the whole world holds its breath and goes

straight to heaven. Only your soul has sworn to never leave this body

and to always keep dancing.

You take a lover who looks at you like maybe you’re magic.

The one who only knows two things in the world—

the arch of your back and your cupid’s bow.

When your hips rock rhythmically, his eyes take on the glow of a man that knows.

Plant the most beautiful words in his ears and wait till they begin to sprout.

Then take an early harvest of love-begotten miracles in April, or May.

Cherish your bright-eyed, magic lover.

Let him praise your knees, your shins, your tendons and thighs.

You deserve to be loved effortlessly.

Outside the confines of time.

There’s no revenge. You are not stupid, hell, no.

You will cherish your blessed lips that can whisper in the ancient language

of love, the language with no words.

Cherish the lips that can kiss, take bites of wild strawberries and nibble

on your lover’s sacred skin.

Take a mouthful of air.

Take a mouthful of his laughter, clearer than a clink of brass.

Take a mouthful of sour apples and fresh-baked bread.

Chow it down. You are.

You loved a man with more hands than a parade of beggars.

You loved a man more beautiful and vibrant than a peacock’s feather.

You lucky, lucky girl.

Go on—and love. Artfully, slowly.

Look every living thing right in the eye with no fear.

You can stare anyone down and you know.

Learn to sing a whale’s song.

Take your love with you everywhere you go.

The world is so big, yet it’s so small.

You must stay gone.

Gone away from those who confuse love with contracts, deals and social trends.

Stay away from those who try to bargain it,

like it is something you only buy from a street peddler,

because he told you that everyone needs to have it.

Stay out of the way of those who hide behind flat-chested sisters or crippled cats

and someone else’s decisions to live someone else’s life.

You lucky, lucky girl.

Go on—and love.

Look every living thing right in the eye with no fear.

Cherish the man that knows.

Let him teach you to be easy with the finity of things.

Your bright-eyed, golden lover.

Have the courage to see yourself with his eyes.

And when he gives you the world—in return, give him a kiss and a smile.

The rest is yours.

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**Author’s note: This poem is a play, a twist on Marty McConnell’s piece “Frida Kahlo to Marty McConnell,” where the sadness of a break-up present in the original poem is replaced by inspiration and a sense of freedom, happiness and empowerment coming from the experience of having loved and being enlightened by being alive, and the discovery that love has no end.

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Author: Sylwia Kolowiecka

Editor: Yoli Ramazzina

Photo: Author’s own.