We know it exists, so it must be true. For a person to fall in love and for one to love another, a being, a thing, a feeling. How do you explain this feeling that is so tangible, that hangs so heavy in the immediate ether surrounding the freshly smitten, and yet is so seemingly delusional and evasive, for it cannot be seen by the casual observer, unless it happens to be the fortunate other partaker in this exercise. And in this intrinsic evasiveness lies the paradox of love for it manages to be so obvious and so veiled at the same time. Many other paradoxes shroud it too. It's innate (parenthood) or cultivated over time; At times it's instant and sometimes it takes its sweet time. It's a thought but also a process, it takes effort but it's also so simple. It's fleeting, or persistent and sometimes it withers. It's accepted by society and sometimes it's a crime. It's so personal between a couple or a few, and yet it's universal, it's so restless but also calm and comforting at the same time.
So many paradoxes! So what is it really? Does it even exist? Is it possible for something so paradoxical to exist, even in imagination, within the mind? If you know you must tell me, because I'm quite perplexed. Let's try to delve a little deeper into its nature to try and find some meaning.
It dwells in many forms. A mother's unwithering love for her offspring, a father's concern. The fire in the loins of a consort, or the passion in the eyes of a lover; the warmth in the eyes of a companion or just the recollection of a close one in someone's ephemeral thoughts. It's also the reassuring slight smile on a beautiful face that shows genuine concern, or the playful twinkle in the eyes of a child. It lives in the security of belonging and also in the trust of a close one. It's in the enchanting smile of your lover, which refuses to leave her pretty face, and in her graceful shyness that emanates from the love for you that she radiates. It is so many things and yet what it is is so hard to explain.
It surfaces too on the first day of spring, after a long winter, or in the sun that peeks through dark clouds. It's to be found in the first rains of monsoon and their lingering earthy petrichor, and also in that first satiating bite of your birthday cake. It lingers too between the lyrics of your favorite song, and in the silences between two lovers. It is equi-present in journeies and their destinations. You can find it in the coolness of the green grass under the shade of a tree, and in the rainbows too in the aftermath of the storm. And it's always and forever in the wag of a tail and in the chirp of a sparrow. It transcends all human boundaries, concepts, ideologies, and touches sapiens and other beings including flora alike. It's to be found everywhere, with everything and yet it's so hard to define.
Is it only in the rosy happiness that you find it? In passion, in happiness and the exciting?
It lives too, ever more so deeply, in the mundane, the everyday, in sorrow and in pain. It's in the tears of separation and in sweet reunions, in the tiffs out of concern and make ups. A comforting hug, an ear lent, a peck on the forehead, an appreciative pat on the back; the hot soup when you are unwell, the company when you feel lost, that extra effort to make time, the little nothing's on a busy day, a little note on the fridge or just a smiley on the misty bathroom mirror; the special quick meal midweek, a hand lent in chores, that bigger slice of pizza, or just a walk together between all the madness; A shoulder to cry on, in silence, a hand to wipe them off, a few words of comfort to bring back the spark of life. A ruse to get you to stay home, to steal some extra togetherness, just a few words to say you are mine.
Love is all of these things, and yet nothing at all. It's a beautiful paradox, that's how I know it and I want it to be. If you can unravel it for me, will you, when you find some time?
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