"The Beautiful Girl in the Second Row" by Nate Jensen

I look at her across the class.

I’ve seen her praying intently in mass.

She is the one I love.

And this is only known by God above.

Her deep, dark hair and beautiful eyes

Shine in the morning light and there are no lies

About how much I love her.

I begin to wonder and I begin to think.

About how beautiful she looks wearing pink.

I begin to wonder and rehearse

How I could profess my love in a simple verse.

But I think, “How foolish I am. Are my eyes shrouded in mist?”

Does she even know I exist?

Yes, she does, but to her, I don’t matter,

Because, apparently, I couldn’t be any fatter.

It seems as though I have low self-esteem.

But her love for me couldn’t be less keen.

I think she is so perfect, and I am so flawed.

And for my sake, I pray to God.

Without even knowing it, I start to smile.

And then she notices me after a while.

I say to her that I love her a lot.

But I find out that truth can’t be fought.

She doesn’t care for me at all.

She barely knows my name.

And as my spirits fall,

No one can understand my pain.

I can’t describe what I felt when this took place.

I felt like I had “ugly” written on my face.

She had “beautiful” all over hers, and that was fine for me.

But now I know that love comes with a fee.

Yes, love can be bought, but not with paper money.

Not even with coin, although that would be rather funny.

So what is the price for love? How do we find the facts?

The price for love is that when you love someone, they might not love you back.