To You Far Away: Love Poems from Twenty Years

My dear:

On the thirty-seventh day since you left, I finally found the peace of mind to turn our twenty years together into the longest love letter.

Do you remember Christmas Eve in 2006? You were bundled up in that muddy-yellow down jacket, your voice hoarse as crumpled letter paper. Yet amid the mechanical routine of a blind date, I heard the rhythm of my heart skipping a beat. Only then did I realize that fate had already written our meeting into the story as a foreshadowing. All those awkward opening lines were the prologue to the long years ahead.

Our love was like an ink painting slowly spreading across the paper. Those nights curled up on the sofa watching dramas, when I'd hand you tissues as you cried over Korean shows; the times I helped grade papers and you laughed so hard you could barely stand at your students' wildly imaginative sentences; and the way you carefully studied formula ingredients while we were trying for a baby, while I clumsily followed online videos to learn how to make soup... These little everyday moments of warmth moved me more than any grand romantic gesture.

I'll never forget you during those nine months of pregnancy. You jokingly called your belly a “little stove,” yet even when the baby's movements kept you awake at night, you still gently stroked your belly and talked to the baby. That's when I understood that the most precious thing in the world wasn't the child yet to be born, but you, the one who had weathered life's storms by my side. When the nurse held our twins, a boy and a girl, and said, “Mother and babies are safe,” I finally understood: happiness is the light that still shines in your eyes after surviving a trial by fire.

Over twenty years, I haven't given you expensive jewelry or made grand promises. All I have is this memoir woven from time. When you come back, we'll write new chapters together, turning our ordinary days into the most beautiful love letter.