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InCause of Love: A Romantic Drags Love |
by:
larry jaffe |
Incause of love, we do many foolish things. We go out on limbs not built for climbing in order to be gallant and free. We rise up to challenges and escape seemingly hum drum lives casting our hearts intounknown. We start wars. We end wars.
This is love, we say, never knowing where we will be struck next. And some are touched for entire lifetimes. And some are struck repeatedly inagony of relationships that start well and end, just as well. We fall in love all too readily.
We know allclichés of soul mates, life mates, true love, perfect love, etc. etc. We find them heartwarming and grand, romantic even. But when we fall out of love, we fall hard for it is much more difficult to fall out of love than into it. There is nothing very romantic aboutbroken heart. We cavalierly declare that it obviously must not have been true love; otherwise, we would still be together. And we peer around corners hoping beyond hope that he or she awaits us.
And some love with their bodies and some with their minds and some find even deeper solace loving todepths of their souls.
For some love like life isjourney. My parents have been married fiveeight years their offspring divorced at least once. Love iscertainty for my folks. They cannot and will not imagine one withoutother. I have never thought that this waslove affair ofages or one filled with passion and romance. There issymbiosis between them,odd dance non-stop for almost six decades. I wonder what keeps them going, that secret formula that keeps them together year after year.
I admire them and often stand in awe. I often have enough trouble living with myself let alone another lately. But their marriage is not all hugs and kisses, lovey dovey type thing. In fact, I barely rememberlast time I saw them in love’s clench. Actually, I remember quite well as it was their fivezeroth Anniversary. My family is nothuggy type. However, it has improved with living. There ismagic something that links them together from morning to night. The romance is hidden but secreted in their hearts and undying vows.
My romanticism leaps from speeding trains, screams from rooftops and dares to be overcome. I love being in love. Nevertheless, these extreme bursts of romantic fervor last years and notlifetime as my folks have accomplished. It makes one wonder because it cuts tocore oflifetime of passion. My parents aremiracle I think to myself. I admire their perseverance and patience.
We speakwords of love. But do we understandintricacies of what makes love work? Do we know how to love another being let alone ourselves? And which comes first loving ourselves (that whole me thing) or loving someone else? And can you truly love another if you are rather misanthropic about yourself?
How much do you need to know aboutsoon to be significant other in order to fall in love? Jeez, I know many questions. Well you see I am taking this thing called love apart into all its facets so questions have to come up in order foranswers to be arrived at. I am using my parents asmodel because they are still doing it after all these years and what makes them persist as they do?
Love isKevlar vest for my heart
I know about my loves and lacks thereof. I tend to dive right in without looking to see if there is water inpool, without thought, fear or concern. Once in love I feel invulnerable like love is this Kevlar vest over my heart. With hindsight, I can see this israther one-sided view of things. A kind of ego ridden love that is so overwhelming that I would needSuperMate notSoulMate. Nevertheless, I lovesudden explosiveness in my universe that love brings, that impact of emotion and energy. I live for that passion. I would not wish to go through life without it! However, maybe this explosive passion flares so brightly and then seemingly burns itself out.
Then again, perhaps not, mayhap that flame would be eternal. I have learned much from each of my loves. I have learned that boredom isfiercest of diseases and punishments.
Redefining love
And I have learned that love must be redefined to be successful. Old school concepts of one heart, one soul, and one love are outdoor. The most important lesson being that true love is moreseparateness of things than it ismushing of things together (note: that istechnical definition).
Love iswillingness anddesire for each to be whole, undivided and unique. Co-creation means one createsteam of love (as corny as that sounds). It isgranting of beingness of another and notdesire to be “one” iscomplete acknowledgement of your love.
Romantics will of course decry this and what I am about to say. They will feign broken heart malaise and woe is me and other assorted inanities. They will beat themselves with bungee cords or some such. Butfact is when you take into considerationstate of current romantics and climbing divorce rates, whatheck do they really know anyway?
Again, I state most emphatically, it is nottogetherness of things, of two lovers glommed together with Madison Avenue wallpaper and notions of what love should be. No, it is nottogetherness butunique separateness that counts and if that uniqueness is admired and given life, love blossoms forth.
All too often, we hum these clichés until we run out of tune. Your LifeMate, your SoulMate, etc. is not half of you, they are entities unto themselves. We inrelationship are not halves of anything; we are whole entirely and uniquely whole.
Team Love
The ridiculousness of this popularized notion of this one beating heart concept is best illustrated when observingrest of life; like say sports (amguy ain’t I). Nowhere inannals of sport does anyone say one player. Players with individual capabilities, characteristics, skills, etc all go into makinggreat team. The individual is not suppressed by his or her teammates; tocontrary, skills and abilities are enhanced. Some teams even take their comradery offfield and hang out together. Why should love sanely and logically be any different? How did we getquaint notion that somehow we must divide ourselves downmiddle and joinother person to make one whole person? When did we decide to be our soulmate instead of ourselves?
Strength is determined and created by two beings creating together, not whittling down to one or even two with broken hearts. It isuniqueness ofplayers that makegreat team, notidenticalness of them. This is after allgame of love.
There are those that may now shout that I am removingromance from love with such analytical statements. And drainingtragedy from broken hearts is blasphemy and sacrilege. I gotta tell you, there is nothing at all romantic about abuse and divorce.
Is it not time to put love onnew level with new ways to measure its impact and affection? We live intwoonest Century now and communication capabilities have truly sped up our lives that are just full of yesterdays and some tomorrows. We live with hindsight have little foresight and I would recommend midsight, i.e. looking at now and seeing what is without hindrance of past or future.
Let us put love back onpedestal where it belongs, something exalted and striven for not to be tossed into liketsunami of emotion. Let us redefine love based on communication and understanding and notdartboard.
Admiration coupled with desire and passion would indeed mean true love for it could not be anything else. And you know he or she may just be aroundcorner.
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Larry Jaffe Bio
Jaffe isCo-founder and International Readings Coordinator forUnited Nations Dialogue among Civilizations through Poetry program and Co-Founder of Poets for Peace. Jaffe isEditor of Poetixpoetry magazine for southern California. He has beenresident Poet/Host atAutry Museum of Western Heritage and producednumber of successful reading series inLos Angeles area includingpopular Buddha Jam Poetry Series atElixir Café and Poetic License atMoondog Café.
He has featured at numerous readings and poetry festivals throughoutUnited States and abroad includingHammer Museum, Japanese American National Museum, Dylan Thomas Centre, Comedy Store, University of Texas, UCLA, UC Northridge, Los Angeles, Austin International, San Luis Obispo, London and Bristol Poetry Festivals.
Jaffe’s work can be found in numerous publications and anthologies like Short Fuse, OffCuff, onezerozero Poets AgainstWar, Urban Spaghetti, Saturday Afternoon Journal, Web Del Sol, PoetryMagazine.com, Will Work for Peace, The World Healing Book, The Book of Hope, etc. Jaffe’s books include Jewish Soulfood, Unprotected Poetry CD andrecently released The Anguish ofBlacksmith’s Forge. His book of poetic noir L. A. Rhapsody is getting ready for publication and Salmon Publishing in Ireland will soon be publishing his Lying Half-Naked inDoorway.
jaffe@lgjaffe.com
www.lgjaffe.com
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