I Wonder What Love Is

To love
Is to tell the dancer
Take the stage
I will beat the drums
I will strum the banjo
I will find the music
That will make you dance
But to be loved…
Ah…
To be loved
Is to lean against the iroko
The iroko that never falls

Reality

I wonder what love is…

Sometimes, it feels like sunshine on the perfect day. I just want to bask in it. But a shadow passes and it becomes a vengeful storm; I just want to get out of it. One day, I’m flying. Another day, I’m drowning. Then, I can’t have enough of it- craving and bursting with insatiable desire. Soon, I’m sick to my heart and dying to tear away. Now, a welcome delight; streaming in like dawn through an open window. Quickly, a horror- ten thousand rivers washing my life away.

Tell me- which one of these tortured, conflicting emotions is love?

I saw a girl yesterday and, I swear, my heart leaped. When she smiled, all the stars lined up in procession and bowed before me. We kissed and tears came to my eyes for my soul had floated up and pressed itself against the highest beam in heaven. I swore- forever. She swore- forever. In a moment, eternity nestled between us. I had never been so happy.

But it wasn’t love. Because when I woke up in the morning I saw that her breath stank. Her right eye slanted and she snapped a lot. She wanted to know where I was all the time. It felt like wearing a tie too tight. She wanted to be held all the time. It felt like wearing a suit too small. There was pain everywhere and when I spoke my voice was a grumble or a loud rumble. She left me in the night. She said she was tired of my snoring.

Tell me- why did the sun not stay in our eyes? Why did eternity not stay on our lips? Why did this rose bloom so red then die so quickly? Is love not the feeling that never dies? No. I grew bald; she didn’t anticipate that. I didn’t know her waist would spread and her breasts would fall. I didn’t think lines would creep across her face. I didn’t guess she had moods. When all the birds were singing in the trees, she seemed like a princess- without blemish; like a five-star hotel room that was already paid for. Nobody told me she was an onerous mortgage I could never hope to finish paying off- an unfinished construction; a long term, energy guzzling project. Till I woke up in the morning and she asked me to make breakfast.