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I'm writing an assignment on how a poem of my choosing represents a person in my life. I'm trying to use the word "my crush" in the essay, but I looked it up in a dictionary and it's an informal word. Is there a formal word for "a crush"?

An example sentence would be:

"The speaker of the poem describes a person that closely resembles my crush".

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  • Crush is widely understood. Besides, you can always cite poetic licence. :)
    – Lawrence
    Jan 3, 2018 at 9:50
  • Have you looked in a thesaurus under "crush"? Be careful, crush has other meanings as well.
    – Mari-Lou A
    Jan 3, 2018 at 10:00
  • @Mari-LouA yes I have, but none of the synonyms have the meaning I'm looking for.
    – Rashid Al Abri
    Jan 3, 2018 at 10:05
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    Then please say which words you have discarded and why. Otherwise, you will get the same answers and they will all be inappropriate. I trust "infatuation" is one of the words you already discarded.
    – Mari-Lou A
    Jan 3, 2018 at 10:09
  • I don't think this is a duplicate to be honest, the person that asked the question above, is asking about a very specific sense of crush... "I mean the subject of an unrealistic, one-sided infatuation. For example, it can be used in this sentence: 'My celebrity crush is David Beckham."
    – Gary
    Jan 3, 2018 at 11:18

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Edit: From your comments in another answer:

Your example sentence (which I moved into your question now):

"The speaker of the poem describes a person that closely resembles my crush"

You could say:

"The speaker of the poem describes a person that closely resembles the person I am in love with"

In love

If you are in love with someone, you feel romantically or sexually attracted to them, and they are very important to you. -- Collins

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Is there a formal word for "a crush"?

Crush is relatively modern and as you say informal idiom. For less informal phrases you might try:

My love

A person you have a profoundly tender, passionate affection for. A person you have a feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection. A person you love. --Urban Dictionary.

E.g. "She is my love".

My heart

Something being so cute that their heart is melting. mostly used by girls. -- Urban Dictionary.

E.g. "She is my heart".

The object of my affection

B1. The cause of someone's feelings: He's the object of my affection. -- Cambridge.

E.g. "She is the object of my affection".

The above is the most formal of the suggestions in this answer, and is more poetic, you wouldn't really use it in every day speech.

The girl/boy that has my heart

In the above example heart is being used figuratively to mean your love, your desire, your attention.

e.g. :

So There's Boy... He Kinda Has My Heart... What does this mean?

It pretty much means you're in love with him, kinda like he has your heart, he's in control of your heart, you gave your heart to him. - Yahoo Answers

e.g. "She has my heart"

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The word you're looking for is infatuation, defined as:

strong but not usually lasting feelings of love or attraction

It's just an infatuation. She'll get over it.
No one expected their infatuation with each other to last.

Source: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/infatuation

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  • Is there a noun form of "infatuation"?
    – Rashid Al Abri
    Jan 3, 2018 at 10:06
  • "infatuation" is a noun. Look at the examples I included. Or did you mean something else?
    – user157304
    Jan 3, 2018 at 10:07
  • I apologize for not being clear. The meaning I'm looking for is the person I'm crushing on "my crush." An example sentece would be: "The speaker of the poem describes a person that closely resembles my crush".
    – Rashid Al Abri
    Jan 3, 2018 at 10:18
  • "the object of my infatuation"? It's a bit too formal, but presumably this is what you want
    – user157304
    Jan 3, 2018 at 11:41

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