they decided to systematize

the concept of love

they’d already done it

with nostalgia, compassion, joy,

everything condensed into a pill

a perfectly packaged product

 

when they first tried it

it was for healing from grief

just take a pill and you can

experience all of it at once

widows would take a pill one morning

then go out that night and get laid

they’d have so much fun they’d

forget to attend the funeral the next day

 

you were able to have multiple lifetimes

in the span of just a week

experience all the intensity of young love

then get married, have a honeymoon

get told “no” once and immediately divorce

take another pill for the heartbreak

and in the morning when you feel alone

do it all over again with someone new

 

those who disagreed with the idea

were called puritans

their suffering through the pain

was seen as pitiable, even masochistic,

“why not just take a pill?” 

they felt, they grieved deeply

sometimes they even romanticized

and wrote beautiful words

that others scrolled past

 

when love came so easy and so cheap

there was no point in having children

cause whose children would you even have?

yesterday’s husband? last week’s?

one lady had gotten married 

one hundred forty three times

during her lunch break

then died of a massive overdose

 

when I visited my grandparents

in the mountains, both terminally offline

i told them my wife had left me

(i didn’t tell them it was the fourth wife this week)

they looked at each other and said

“honey, i thought you said you were gay”