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Day 05 - Your definition of love, in great detail (and poetry)
I don't beilieve in any kind of one-and-only, one-soul-in-two-bodies, inevitable and meant-to-be soulmates. Love develops as you grow into one another. And there's not jsut one person that can happen with, although there's many it never will. But it's not smooth, or automatic, or inevitable, no matter how perfect you may seem together. There will always be points that it will fail if one of you doesn't turn round and say 'I want this. This will work.' And too many for one person to do all the saying.
Love is a journey, not a destination.
So I don't believe in love at first sight. But I do believe in near-instantaneous attraction, connection, compatibility. (Apart from the times it all turns out to be wishful thinking.)
Love is a complex mix of different and same.
Even with someone you know well, and connect with, and care about, there will always be a massive gulf between the me and the not me. Love is finding ways of bridging that gap, and communicating across the void. Just because someone doesn't use the same words as you, or even use words at all, that doesn't mean they don't feel it, or mean it. (Which I always have to keep reminding myself.)
Love is both a fully conscious decision, and the only decision it seems possible to take.
Love is making room for someone else in your life.
Love is losing something, and gaining something, and never knowing or caring who came out best on the deal.
Love is a seduction, and a surrender.
Love is irrational, but probably not imaginary.
Love is all about want, never should. 'You should bring me flowers, because that's what a boyfriend should do' is going nowhere. 'I want you to dress up when we go out to dinner because that makes me feel like a goddess' isn't. (Want may just be the start of negotiations, but at least it's an honest start.)
Love is an equal and opposite reaction, apart fromt that it never is.
Love is letting go of control.
Live is the bits there aren't any words for.
Love is imperfect.
Scary.
And, because it seems vaguely appropriate and I don't think I posted it at the time, here's the sonnet I wrote for the OU poetry course last year.
And afterwards, curled close, I lie alert
bewildered by this unfamiliar form,
meeting mine in the wrong places; warning
that you are not him and I am not her,
whoever she was, that has shaped your slumber,
her story traced in every sprawling limb,
scrawled in faded tongues across your skin.
The weight of your history strikes me dumb
until you turn, spine curving, coupling mine;
so it begins. Dream deep, my palimpsest.
As my body moulds your frame to my design
I will learn the foreign rhythms of your breath.
And in the morning, in our second act,
I'll etch my own sharp lines upon your back.
Topic list is here
I don't beilieve in any kind of one-and-only, one-soul-in-two-bodies, inevitable and meant-to-be soulmates. Love develops as you grow into one another. And there's not jsut one person that can happen with, although there's many it never will. But it's not smooth, or automatic, or inevitable, no matter how perfect you may seem together. There will always be points that it will fail if one of you doesn't turn round and say 'I want this. This will work.' And too many for one person to do all the saying.
Love is a journey, not a destination.
So I don't believe in love at first sight. But I do believe in near-instantaneous attraction, connection, compatibility. (Apart from the times it all turns out to be wishful thinking.)
Love is a complex mix of different and same.
Even with someone you know well, and connect with, and care about, there will always be a massive gulf between the me and the not me. Love is finding ways of bridging that gap, and communicating across the void. Just because someone doesn't use the same words as you, or even use words at all, that doesn't mean they don't feel it, or mean it. (Which I always have to keep reminding myself.)
Love is both a fully conscious decision, and the only decision it seems possible to take.
Love is making room for someone else in your life.
Love is losing something, and gaining something, and never knowing or caring who came out best on the deal.
Love is a seduction, and a surrender.
Love is irrational, but probably not imaginary.
Love is all about want, never should. 'You should bring me flowers, because that's what a boyfriend should do' is going nowhere. 'I want you to dress up when we go out to dinner because that makes me feel like a goddess' isn't. (Want may just be the start of negotiations, but at least it's an honest start.)
Love is an equal and opposite reaction, apart fromt that it never is.
Love is letting go of control.
Live is the bits there aren't any words for.
Love is imperfect.
Scary.
And, because it seems vaguely appropriate and I don't think I posted it at the time, here's the sonnet I wrote for the OU poetry course last year.
And afterwards, curled close, I lie alert
bewildered by this unfamiliar form,
meeting mine in the wrong places; warning
that you are not him and I am not her,
whoever she was, that has shaped your slumber,
her story traced in every sprawling limb,
scrawled in faded tongues across your skin.
The weight of your history strikes me dumb
until you turn, spine curving, coupling mine;
so it begins. Dream deep, my palimpsest.
As my body moulds your frame to my design
I will learn the foreign rhythms of your breath.
And in the morning, in our second act,
I'll etch my own sharp lines upon your back.
Topic list is here
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