Love Poem Books Novels & Stories

She had to summarize all that in that first encounter or otherwise she would be wasting her time. He was looking down at his book, legs crossed. “Love is A Dog From Hell” by Charles Bukowski. An excellent choice of literature, she thought. He was wearing a long-sleeved knitted sweater and washed-out blue jeans, dark brown leather boots, too clean for hiking boots, he looked more like an indoor guy.

I was about to turn away—honestly, I’d already proven my point by existing in here—when something caught my eye. A book. Not just any book. It had a dark velvet cover, stitched along the edges, with delicate silver embossing. Fancy. A little dramatic. Totally Sebastian. I picked it up, flipping it open without a second thought. He should’ve hidden it better if he didn’t want anyone snooping. The first page stopped me cold. A poem. Not the gross, rhyming kind either. It was... good. Too good. The kind that actually made you feel something.

“Mind if I read to you, princess of pain?” “Only if you feed me chocolate between stanzas.” He grinned. “Deal.” He sat beside me and opened the book with a kind of reverence that didn’t match his cocky voice. The poems he read weren’t romantic. Not exactly. But they had teeth. Rhythm. Rage. And something underneath it all that felt like devotion, buried deep. I listened with my eyes closed, breathing in the sound of his voice, the scent of tea, the ghost of Luca’s touch, the fading warmth of Nico’s fingers.

Stories of tides that never forgot. One morning in early March, when the almond trees were heavy with blossom again, she found an old envelope tucked inside the pages of a book he had been reading the winter before he died. The book was a worn copy of Neruda’s Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair, the spine cracked open to poem fifteen. The envelope was yellowed, unsealed, addressed to her in his careful handwriting. She carried it to the terrace. Sat in his chair. Opened it slowly.

I must have dozed off while I was reading earlier. The Poems of Francis Ledwidge – the moth-eaten emerald green book I found in the study – is lying next to my pillow, the gold-embossed oak leaves on the cover glinting in the lamplight. The last thing I remember reading before nodding off was a poem gran had often sung to me as a bedtime lullaby. That book of the page is creased, dog-eared. The poem is about a water spirit who died after falling in love, which seemed to be one of Francis Ledwidge’s favorite themes – doomed love, tragic, beautiful maidens and lots and lots of flowers.

I make my way through the aisles, my fingers trailing along the spines of books, until I reach the poetry section. I don't know why I'm drawn here. I just am. My body moves like it knows something my brain doesn't. I walk through the poetry section, line by line, shelf by shelf, until I stop. My hand freezes mid-reach. 'Pablo Neruda.' A whole row of his work, lined up neatly, my fingers pause over one book in particular. 'Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair.' I pull it off the shelf slowly, like it might bite me. The cover is worn, soft under my fingers, like someone's held this book a lot and loved it.

This was what contentment felt like. This was what having your entire world contained in your arms felt like. “What are you reading?” I asked, noting the way she relaxed completely against me, trusting me to hold her, to keep her safe. “Poetry. Some old collection I found in the back corner.” “Any good?” “Some of it. Though most of it is very dramatic. Lots of tortured souls and unrequited love.” “Sounds depressing.” “A little. But some of the love poems are beautiful. Listen to this one.” She opened the book and began to read in that soft, musical voice that never failed to capture my complete attention.

He began contemplating death. I turned another. Still death. “No.” I put it back. The sixth was poetry. Better. I opened near the middle. Grain. I read the next poem. Also grain. I checked farther back. Rain. Then grain after rain. I closed the book. Six Veyrathi books. Not one romance. This was a catastrophe of modest but genuine proportions. I looked at the shelf again in case a seventh had developed while I was reading about grain. It had not.

His smile could light up the entire library. He settles into the leather wingback, my favourite chair, the one I curl up in when I want to feel held, and opens his book. I catch a glimpse of the cover. Pablo Neruda. Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair. “Why are you reading that?” He looks up at me. “What?” I clear my throat. What the fuck are you doing Vanessa? I adjust the collar of my shirt. “Neruda. Why are you reading it?”

Gladys says, smiling at me and the ladies scream in longing at what has been bestowed for me. “Lastly…” Gladys says, presenting a stack of book towards me. “This is a volume of the king’s favorite books, bound in the finest leather and edged in gold. These poems are shared with you as a token of his desire to connect through the words that move him." Once again, there is an audible sigh spread through the women. "To share his favorite verses," one woman mused aloud. “To connect with him on such an intimate level... What I would give to hold that book, to read the words that move him." Another adds.