FEELING LOVED _ a poem by Yuri Kageyama

You would tug at my elbow,

Meaning No,

When I stared too long at a good-looking guy,

To be fair, you would never gawk at beautiful women,

Although you might have been doing it when

I wasn’t looking.

You lived up to that Ideal,

The perfect faithful husband,

At least in that way, which

Makes you a good guy,

Despite all your failings

In other ways.

Because that is what love is:

Doing everything that makes the person you love

Feel

Loved

And not doing anything that might make that person you love

Not

Feel

Loved.

You said as you lay dying:

“I feel loved.”

And I knew I had done good.

In our Love.

This is the second installment in a series, which follows the first installment “What Do You Think?” These poems will be part of a bigger piece I am working on about Japanese American men. I don’t have a title for either the series or the bigger piece yet.