The Pain of Love

To fall in love...to taste the drug of the mind.
To crave another person, desire their attention,
To feel your pulse, your breath change tune whenever you think of them.
But like the moon, it has its cycles,
Sometimes bright, full, and in view,
Other times faint or below the horizon.
A mood that changes and flows.
Every new love fresh and you are high once more.
But to love, well, that is different.
To choose to give to another even when there is no high,
To reach out to someone you might not otherwise consider,
Is that not better?
But to love is to be vulnerable.
For there is much risk involved.
When the emotional high fades, one is none the worse for wear.
A sting, and then forgotten.
To move on, grow up, learn, and then to fall in love again,
maybe a little more hesitant, but still desiring to live.
But to love...is to taste pain.
To grieve over and over again.
To know that love is not equal.
Mutual, sometimes, yes. But not equal.
Love is painful.
To sacrifice the freedom of living alone,
sacrifice parts of yourself for the sake of another.
To give up precious time, and emotional strength.
To become rash on decisions and make financial changes.
And whether their intentions are well and good or not,
you will be used.
The child takes, the lover absorbs.
They will lean on you,
and if you truly love,
then you will want to be strong,
to provide,
to continue to give,
to be leaned upon.
And you'll want to lean back - just enough so.
Not to be a burden to them,
but to have them feel needed and wanted.
But the problem with being human,
is that one is always swaying -
leaning or being leaned upon too much.
And fear settles in.
Too far?
Too much?
Too little?
Not enough?
But love does not ask for much in return.
Love is sacrifice.
To really love is a beautiful thing.
But humanity uses and abuses love.
We all do.
I am guilty of it.
And I have felt the effects of the other side of the coin.
I gave, only to have it all taken away.
Ripped from me.
And I loved again, but it was not reciprocated.
To love is to be vulnerable.
To love yet not be loved, or to love and be wronged...is agony.
...but it is worth it.
For it is all we have.
To love -
is to die in order to live.
To love -
is to provide hope for one who has none.
To love -
is to give because you had been given to.
To love -
is to be Somebody for a Nobody.
To love -
is to bleed to provide life.
This is the pain of love.