You carved our initials into the tree,

its freshly branded surface showing green

through the crevices of our letters,

the injured young bark smelling of spring, new life

and the sappy tree-blood you told me

not to worry about;

it was inevitable that our love-tattoo

required a sacrifice,

a certain amount of painful exposure.

We grinned at the cliche as you traced out

a heart to guard our names,

but we both saw the newness of our heart,

the way it bulged out,

slightly too wide on the left side,

the accidental overlap of the bottom point,

imperfections that made it real,

made it ours.

We left the tree knowing it would grow,

change unimaginably,

the branches destined to stretch and push

themselves into new spaces

until we might 

no longer recognize it.

But we also knew we were guaranteed the

permanence of our togetherness

there on the rough bark,

our lopsided heart destined to grow upward

but never apart,

the swirling curve of the ampersand

an anchor in an ever-changing world.