I reckon there's a lot of really good stuff mixed in with a lot of quite cliche stuff. This might work considering your main audience - your boyfriend - who may be perfectly happy with dollops of extra mush because love is like that <img src="e.deviantart.net/emoticons/s/s…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Smile)"/> But from a more artistically objective perspective I reckon you could cut out about half of this, smooth the rough edges obviously, and have a much tighter and more genuinely original love poem.

eg.


I am telling you these things.

[I am telling you about] << I don't think these words are strong enough to bear immediate repetition - all the ways you have made me this cliché, this poor metaphor of you

[getting under my skin, stealing my breath] << I know you've mentioned cliche, but these are very boring cliches - , taking up the largest
space in my heart where you've curled your long limbs to make
them fit. Sleep quietly there among the valves and vessels,
atria molding around your body. << Better. You've alborated on the cliche in an interesting way</i> -
Holding you.

I am telling you about all the ways you have slipped into the empty spaces of my body, </i>[the blanks I had not known about and filled them in] << you're saying the same thing twice using the same metaphor:

suturing wounds, smoothing over scars and ragged edges, pressing palms
against the dying bruises <<better! again!, - whispering? whispering? eh, just not the most exciting verb. I'd actually prefer "saying" which is at least more discreet, but it's up to you,

This is what I do. I will not go away.

I don't say it, but I know.



I like the description of a mouth saying the word love in iii. But the stanzas after it (in iii.), again, get a little dull.

In v. I think You catch me is very misleading; I catch you (though you might want to change "catch" to another verb) would make more sense. Three of the the four images in the next stanza are fantastic. But the smell of you caught in my sheets is boring!

Like I say. Things that are dull to general readers are not always boring to lovers. Depends exactly what you want from the poem. But I think there are really strong bits fighting against some not so strong bits, and I reckon a good trim would sort it out.

(also, ignore star ratings)

<img src="e.deviantart.net/emoticons/s/s…" width="15" height="15" alt="" title=" (Smile)"/>