In Life with Love

Why in the world

Would you fall in love

With an imaginary character —

Someone you can’t have?

It occurred to me

That maybe, before I was born,

My soul fell in love

With life on Earth,

And it seemed but a dream.

I don’t remember, as an adult,

How delightful it must have been

To find myself here:

Impossible made real.

And then what?

We all know.

“Life is a drag.”

“Earth is hell.”

“What am I doing in this horrid place?”

And finally that one:

“I wish I was never born.”

But then, in the middle

Of all gloom, disappointments and traumas,

We come across Someone,

Real or imaginary,

Who makes us feel alive again.

Yet another misfortune,

One may think —

Because they’re unavailable.

But their presence, even virtual,

Glues the broken pieces

Of our battered psyche

Back together...

And this current moment

Is not lived in vain,

Because we think of them.

We long for them

Like a plant for the sun,

Like the soul, somewhere,

In the world of ideas,

Longs for the body

To live in, —

The same one

Which is later criticized,

Abused, neglected,

Or taken for granted.

Aha! Now it makes sense.

They make us fall in love

With Life...

Again.

December 22, 2020.

N.B.