plead to love

a tiny plead from the lover, for the beloved.

alivia horsley

I am trying to love. Which is to say, I am merely walking to the place where the journey to love begins. Oh my dear friend, if only I could tell you how the dreams of loving have already filled my heart. One simply feels engulfed by such force, I find myself always coming back for more. My other dear friend Rilke says “To love means to radiate with inexhaustible light.” If only I could tell you how the faraway brightness of this light fills my day. It is not the case that I am not scared of coming closer to this light. My dear friend, I am terrified, I can feel my heart bursting at any second. What a beautiful explosion, I would think, If this was to be my fate. 

Rainer Maria Rilke, Journal of My Other Self

The compliment of love belongs not to the beloved, but to the lover. The lover starts to notice traces of the beloved between every flicker of beauty—Have you seen that cloud of smoke? The petals that have already fallen, have you seen the kindness in the way it rots? The lover sees all the beauty because of the beloved. I can not tell you if it is the beloved that makes everything so beautiful, or if it is the secret of love that lights up the eye. I can only tell you that the beauty I see in the face of every stranger is making me want to get on my knees and cry. I swear if I loved more I would have to rip my eyes out, just to realize one sees with the heart. Just to see that every sound is like a stab to my gentle heart, my beloved’s voice is hidden between the gentle sound of the wind, the sweep, and I even once felt it in the cry of sheep. Yes, it does pain me from time to time, to feel so much of my beloved in every corner, and never reach to the beloved yard. It is terrifying, my dear friend, to imagine I will never reach the hand of the one I love. 

E. E. Cummings

You dear friend, the flower that blooms in the garden of my heart, it is indeed the dearest thing to think that I have once felt the beloved, so long ago, that memories of such beauty linger in my mind. It is the most joyful thought that seems to caress my heart, the possibility of the beloved loving me just as much.

I am not yet sure if this is the right way to love, if I can go any closer, or if I will fall down somewhere on my way and never realize I am already lost. One could be drowning in blasphemy and think they are swimming in the soft waters of love. My dear friend, I see no other hope in me, other than to try, and I am trying to love.