CHAPTER 25 - What Is Love?

Love, Loss, Loneliness and Longing, part 9

* What Is Love?

Shakespeare said “Love is not time’s fool”, Virgil exclaimed “Love conquers all”, The Beatles suggested, “All you need is Love”. According to Saint Augustine, God is the only one who can truly and fully love you, because love with a human lets in flaws such as jealousy, suspicion, fear, anger, and contention. Euripides declared “He is not a lover who does not 'love' forever.” Take your pick. Sure all of that is so damn true. Isn't it?

Whatever Love is; I felt like I was breaking inside. I was blown into pieces, breaking down. I could not hold on to the stark truth that Una is no longer there. Oftentimes, I had thought of going away to someplace else than here to see if I can come back and make amends with her. What was I thinking? I could do no such thing; for it wasn’t entirely up to me to do so. Neither did she I believe was able to come round. Una wasn’t interested to come to see me; after all that Savitha did to her, she could not make time to even think about our failed relationship rationally or realistically. No chance of that happening. It never happened. So many years have withered away ever since I lost my one saving love. I will go back to the days I spent with her, but I know I can do that just in my memories now.

The desire to fall in love again is dead. Or have I lost my mind completely? If not, then how do I get a handle on such suicidal ideation? It’s better to rot in hell than fall in love again. It’s hard to keep on going this way; with no hope of an absolution even. Memories keep on replaying endlessly in my mind. How many times of some “Therapy” would get me out of this morose situation? Much thanks to you God for not replying!

The course of true love never runs smoothly; if I had truly loved her, I should set her free - such oft-repeated banalities have however become a soul-food for me to survive on. I missed her so greatly that often I ran up to the terrace of my building and cried my heart out. After being abandoned in love what could you possibly do? Except, of course, pontificate? On what? What had remained for me? And hold it all out on the monstrosity of the seemingly merciless world you have to inhabit it! Or do I indulge in some meandering psycho-babble for my attendant friend who had come to stand by me to console me? And who, not knowing whether to make head or tail of it, acknowledges your rush of emotions as “a kind cruelty of the surgeon’s knife!”

Yet I want to know what love is.

"I want to know what love is, I want you to show me 

I want to feel what love is, I know you can show me” 

– Foreigner

To be a man strong enough to see this thing through was very hard for my hurt soul to endure – which was already hard done by her. Whenever my imagination had a free run, I took her into my arms and never let go. Now, my thoughts reflect the loving hopes of my heart and whenever they wander they always take me to her. There was nothing more worthwhile in my life than purely love her. I realized that she is on my mind more often than any other thought; from the time I wake up till I close my eyes. Many a time, in the dazed afternoons, I have heard songs of melancholy that brought back the unforgettable memories of the past. A sigh or two somehow managed to escape out of my world-wearied soul even as my eyes betrayed tears of passion.

It is only now that I have learned what Sir Elton John always knew: that “And it’s no sacrifice” because it is “just a simple word” and “it's two hearts living in two separate worlds”. Can’t help feeling wasted away without the one and only love I had sacrificed…

END OF PART 9 OF ‘LOVE, LOSS, LONELINESS AND LONGING, part 9’

(To be continued...)

By Arindam Moulick

* Note: The above story Chapter 25 – What Is Love? is reproduced here verbatim from the original story titled "The Memory of Love, a short story" (web link: http://arindammoulick.blogspot.in/2011/07/memory-of-love-short-story.html) published here in my blog Pebbles On The Beach. "The Memory of Love, a short story" was written in the year 2011 with different character names (but same storyline) is finding its way here as part of the chapter-wise presentation of my memoir "Lost Days of Glory, a Memoir". I have merely changed the character names of the original story with new names and additionally made some small changes (basically some words/sentences are put in a different way) in the overall narrative to suit the present storyline titled under “Chapter 25 – What Is Love?” This is for the reader’s information only.

Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction. All incidences, places, and characters portrayed in the story are fictional and entirely imaginary. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is purely coincidental. No similarity to any person either living or dead is intended or should be inferred.