Love

True love is dark.

True love is acceptance.

Accepting ANYTHING, and loving regardless.

Accepting change, and weakness, 

and badness, and difference, 

and loving anyway.

True love is passive.

Learning that love leaves you more open to hatred,

than you ever were before.

Love is love, even in hate, in frustration,

in the inevitable subjugation of the self,

in acceptance, in submission, we grow...

in acceptance, we learn humility...

A little subjugation of the soul,

never hurt anybody.

Love has no pride.

True love turns our energies outward,

ruptures the pieces that we painstakingly 

built ourselves upon, into an explosion,

breaking us inside, forcing the spirit

out into the world, to be, to grow, to live...

True love truly should be 

that which makes us everything

that we can be.

But love, real love,

love that grows us, 

like seedlings brought into the light,

is not desperate.

Desperation is dysfunction.

True love, functional love, is calm.

It does not "need" nor "despair",

nor swallow a lover whole in it's maw.

Dysfunctional love,

as it both opens our cracks and fills them,

is the hardest to leave.

When will the fools realize,

that the force that ensnares them most firmly, 

is not love, but NEED?

What we seek is not love.

It is reassurance. Validation. Release.

Affirmation. Security. Protection. Guidance.

A temporary relief from fear.

Love, real love, does not fear.

It does not fear lonesomeness,

nor rejection, nor loss, nor time,

nor inadequacy, nor competition.

If you think you love, ask yourself first,

do you fear?

If you think you do not fear, ask,

Am I enough, by myself?

You will never help another to grow,

to be more than they are,

if you need them in order to complete yourself.

If you love in need, or fear, you do not truly love.

You only satisfy yourself.

Satisfaction is not love. It is only respite from need.

Contentment is not love. It is blindness.

If you see romance, that is not love.

When you feel his warmth, that is not love.

Love is not firelight, nor beauty, nor self-sacrifice,

nor warmth nor companionship.

It is not love which makes us smile in the night,

it is not love which makes us weep in the street.

You are not ready to love, if you don't know what love is.

If you cannot walk away, you are not ready to love.

You cannot win if you are not ready to lose.

You cannot see clearly, things which are too close.

Love, of which we speak so lightly,

is an intellectual pursuit.

It is not grounded in instinct,

nor in the bundle of neuroses we call "emotions".

True love does not come naturally.

It has to be earned.

It has to be earned, 

in the fires that burn away our needs and wants.

It has to be earned, 

when we face down our worst fears...

(Fears, those fears,

the ones we didn't know existed, 

in the dark days, 

the days when we thought 

we could avoid attack

by not learning how to defend...

blind days,

when our certainty was our undoing,

and we blinded ourselves,

so we didn't have to see the truth,

blinded by fairy-tales,

poking our children's eyes from their faces,

before they could see...)

Love is not blind.

Fear is blind.

Love illuminates our fear.

Amplifies and magnifies the shadows,

amplifies the allure,

amplifies the anxiety,

amplifies the appeal,

amplifies the anger,

amplifies the arousal.

Princes and princesses,

die in this land of shadows.

Lies and fantasies,

blow away in this wilderness,

scoured out by the sand,

just their bones left to bake,

in the eternal sunshine of love. 

Are you ready to love yet?

Reviews

[Muse]

Dysfunctional love,
as it both opens our cracks and fills them,
is the hardest to leave.
When will the fools realize,
that the force that ensnares them most firmly,
is not love, but NEED?
Wow....no wonder love is so damn complicated. You explain the highs and lows of it very well. No matter how you look at it.....real love takes work if you want it to grow. Well penned.

[Arabdha]

very lyrical..agree with Coyote-could be made into a song with good music..summed up love beautifully..good work ! :)

[Coyote Poetry]

Wow is my response to this amazing poem. Could be like a song with some good music to add to the strength of this poem. Your description of love is true. I believe kindness and love is what the world needs. Negative steal from the good in the world. I like poetry that ends with a question. Thank you for the excelelnt poem.
Coyote

[Crow]

Another well written work that speaks volumes about the truths of love.

I truly enjoyed this piece.

[Luke Ritta]

well done.....like the whole poem and loved the way it looked.

[joshua deathdealer]

I'm not sure if we are ever truly ready for love. lol I like how your poem nails down the truths of true love. So many people are caught up in their needs instead of being unconditional. I really enjoyed this write Zoe..xx

[Chris]

Zoe,

I Listened to this (cap intended) not to JUST hear. I came, opened... looked - saw the title and wondered your perspective, picked it, entered and sat back to let your thoughts touch me. And I listened. The voice was paced and unrushed, reasoned and clear. The tones drew without taking away from the thoughts - mine or (more importantly) yours. I do feel I understand what you wanted to express and that of itself says a lot of the quality of this poem.

And with your ending - the answer speaks best inside as a personal decision.

Thank you for speaking.

Chris

[Rene Velez]

This is insightful, good and analytical, thought provoking..

[Liza]

Love is not easy and you have outlined it so sweetly but don't beat around with the idea of a constant utopia some mistakenly think it should be. Are we ready?: Well; if it were easy; everybody would do it....nice ending!