love...

such a short word, only four letters- definition as found in merriam webster's dictionary- 1- strong affection, 2- warm attachment, 3- desire based on attraction, 4- unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for others... but what does this really mean? you go to look up a word in the dictionary, and find it necessary to look up another, and another... until you are finally back to that original word to which you were seeking a meaning for.

what does love really mean? it is a feeling, yes, but to simply call it a "strong affection" would be an immense understatement. if you had to describe to someone who had never been cared for, never cared about something or someone, what love was, how would you do it? you could say it was a warm, fuzzy feeling you got... but then you would have to explain that you didn't mean like a coat... how do you grasp the true definition of something so intangible in this limited language we have created for ourselves. the vocabulary we have produced for our use is greatly flawed, for it can only describe so much- it is only truly appropriate for things with no depth. computer, keyboard, paper, pencil, book- these are all actual things- we know them, can accurately define them... there is no subtlety about them. they are what they are and that is all. there are no underlying currents, no invisible eddies that we must cover in our verbal approach to explaining them. but emotion- ah, how are we to do that? happy, sad, angry, love, ... these all have so many parts and different points to them. we know what they are, but when we try to put our knowledge into words, ... we are lost. humans and the different aspects of their personalities are far too complex to put into specific enough and accurate enough terms to truly grasp the meaning that therein lies. even i have extensive knowledge of the english language, but i would be gravely mistaken to claim that i had the certainty of how to define 'love'...

we are bound by the limit of our words' denotations, and given a false hope by the connotations we derive from the words we speak. yet through all this we still insist upon using this imperfect form of communication we have created for ourselves. there lies the irony- in a society much consumed and obsessed with faultlessness, we use it every day. how can three such simple words- 'i love you'- even though two are of assured certainty, completely convey those sentiments and passions which we feel in ourselves? this barrage of affection that flows through our whole being like , sustains us like the air, and nourishes us like food? that we could live off of for all eternity and beyond? that, if stolen away, or broken, would kill us as bittersweetly as a sentence buried deep within the fathomless, yet so shallow, words of a note from a lover, if in a lover's note they be? that stalk us as persistently as our shadows do; yet soon cradle us as does the cushion of air when we fall from that cloud we have so surely set ourselves down upon, though we did fall to it in the first place, having fallen in love.

Yes, I am speaking on this subject for I am 'in love', whatever sense those words do possess in their most liberal sense. I am not close-minded: i do not take them for what they are, or rather, what they are said to be; strong affection? such a misprint, the hand that wrote it should be shot for. Alas, i am not the author- for if i had been, i would not so dishonor the word with such a limited definition. Instead, i would have tried to do it justice by saying 'yet to be defined...'

©Julie Pyle, 2005