Do You Think of Me?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjZi-bW_wns

Behind the Poem

I don’t think people realize that poems aren’t always linear. They don’t always move from Point A to Point B. Sometimes they circle. Sometimes they double back. Sometimes they tell on you before you’re ready to admit the truth.

“Do you think of me?” is not linear—at least not in its rawest form. This poem was written after a breakup—but it didn’t start there.

When I first began writing, I was thinking about someone new. A crush. That early, intoxicating phase where my mind was running ahead of reality. I found myself wondering what she was doing, what she was eating, what she was listening to. My thoughts kept circling her—soft, curious, hopeful. So I followed them onto the page.

But as the poem unfolded, something shifted.

As I walked myself down the imaginary road of what life could look like with this new person, I realized I wasn’t just imagining the future. I was revisiting the past. Fantasizing about what could have been—with my ex. An emotion I had never fully processed resurfaced, quietly but unmistakably.

It wasn’t until I wrote the line, “But how many different ways can I say, ‘I love you’ / Other than, ‘I. Love. You.’” that the truth caught up with me.

I still loved her.

Not the idea of her.

Not the memory of us.

Her.

I still wished she thought about me. I still wished we could find our way back to each other. And sitting there with that realization, I also knew something else—I knew she had already moved on. So I had to let go.

And that’s a different kind of strength. Because loving someone doesn’t always mean holding on. Sometimes it means releasing them with honesty—even when your heart is still catching up to your head.

That’s why this poem keeps asking the same question. Not because I expected an answer—but because I was slowly accepting one.

And if you’ve ever found yourself imagining a future only to discover you were still grieving a past, then this poem isn’t just about infatuation. It’s about emotional timing. It’s about recognizing what you haven’t processed—and choosing to grow anyway.

Beyond the Blog

"Do You Think of Me?" lives on my spoken word album eight twenty eight. You can stream the album wherever music is available.