To be honest, I always thought that love - real, true, honest love - would heal all of my pain. That all of the suffering that I’ve felt in my life would right itself like a wilted plant after a hefty watering. I came up with this idea when I was 13. I knew nothing about anything. In the love I experienced after this age, I did feel a weight lifted. I felt a shift in my guttural universe. But I always thought - too bad, we got so close. The pain remained. Better luck next time. I am destined to be Sylvia Plath: one day you’ll find me with my head stuck in the oven.
I kept hope, because I noticed that the love I felt from person to person kept getting deeper, which meant to me that it would keep chipping at the pain until it was gone. Right now, I’m experiencing the most intense and indelible love I have ever felt. It has blown everything out of the water; it feels like how love in movies looks. And the pain is not only there; I have realized that none of the pain ever left. Love doesn’t have the power to remove pain. Love has an even better capability: it strengthens itself through common suffering. And we have both suffered. We can both say, I understand, and mean it. The pain I carry has been tinted with love. I've been thinking about how Michelangelo managed to draw the torture of Tityus in such a beautiful and erotic manner that it convinces us of the ambivalence of love. "Who will win out between sweetness and sorrow?"
Before you, I have never looked at someone and felt true terror and awe for the intensity of the feeling. It is a primordial emotion. It’s what Stephen Chbosky means when he writes, “and in that moment, we were infinite”. Before you, I’ve never had a kiss that felt like it belonged at the end credits. Before you, I don’t think I was even really alive. When I am at a loss for words, when words would disgrace the name of the feeling, I know now that must be love. There is no doubt. It is a clear sky as far as the eye can see.
to die by your side is such a heavenly way to die
No comments:
Post a Comment