Love at Theme Parks

A Love Poem

The first day we walk in holding hands, smiling, looking around,

gull of energy and hope and assumptions by the afternoon it hits —

we are two different people actually you, wanting to take up every bit of time with rides, lines, the “meat” of the

park as you called it, me wanting to people watch, sit, observe, maybe watch a show — anything but ride a ride,

at first, there’s confusion, tension, this difference is not new — we know I am me

and you are you, it’s just — we thought, perhaps, we would tackle this family vacation in the same way, same form, hand in hand

and we realized, I realized, we said, that sometimes love means knowing when to go do separate things, in our own ways

with love and acceptance and joy for each other intact and in hearts meeting up again and again throughout the day, after you spent your time in

ways that gave you value and less stress, and I spent mine in ways that gave me value, and less stress

giving us time to regroup, rejoin, and then share things about our different days, our different time

this is, I noted, just as much love as hand in hand side by side PDA display this is, I noted, perhaps even more love than that —

the seeing, the knowing, the trust and return, over and over again — the shared experience of honoring each other’s differences

and of respecting the uniqueness and needs of each other as we walk hand in hand, talking yet tired,

discussing a day well spent, separately and together.

Jenny Justice is a poet mom who longs to bring poetry to life in ways that spark empathy, connection, joy, and feeling. She loves writing love poems, climate change awareness poems, poems for kids, and of course, poems about poetry and poets. You can follow her on Medium and at Jenny Justice, Writer. You can follow her poetry at Justice Poetic.