On White Dresses and Time

I wore the dress today.

The white one

The one you said I looked lovely in

The one I wore the first time you held me,

The first time I let myself be held by anyone.

It’s looser now.

Not clinging as tightly to my every curve as you did, as if showing my dress how it’s done.

I don’t know why it mattered today.

Why I remembered you.

Why I remembered looking up at you from my resting place on your chest.

How you laughed at me when you stretched and I held you closer.

You thought it was cute how I was wriggling my way in.

I didn’t find it funny but held you still.

I remember looking in the mirror after,

Smoothing my dress over,

Pulling back my hair.

It’s so much shorter now.

It’s been three years.

The dress still fits,

Though not as tightly,

And I wonder at how you called me perfect when every day I fear an added pound.

But the girl that filled this dress out was a girl you loved.

A girl you held tightly,

A girl you wept over when she let you go.

I wonder what I would trade for you.

Or for what I remember us having.

Would I trade the miles, the degrees, the pieces of me I’ve built in the time it’s taken to make this dress fit loosely?

Would I let it hug me again if it meant getting the same from you.

You used to cling so tightly to me,

As if showing my soul how love is done.