On Valentine's Day, I enjoy sharing some quotes and reflections about love with you. Since it's that time of year again, here are some more thoughts about romance just for you. The first quote I want to share with you is from Bob Marley (1945-1981), famed Jamaican reggae singer, songwriter and musician. The words are beautiful, but I have to take issue with the first and last lines. With regard to the first line, I think that people can fall in love again if their soulmate dies. It may not be exactly the same, but it is a shared intimacy that does not diminish of nullify the previous relationship. With regard to the last line, no one should regard another human being as his or her "only hope and security." No matter how strongly we love someone, it is unhealthy to be so emotionally dependent on someone else.
Only once in your life, I truly believe, you find someone who can completely turn your world around. You tell them things that you've never shared with another soul and they absorb everything you say and actually want to hear more. You share hopes for the future, dreams that will never come true, goals that were never achieved and the many disappointments life has thrown at you. When something wonderful happens, you can’t wait to tell them about it, knowing they will share in your excitement. They are not embarrassed to cry with you when you are hurting or laugh with you when you make a fool of yourself. Never do they hurt your feelings or make you feel like you are not good enough, but rather they build you up and show you the things about yourself that make you special and even beautiful. There is never any pressure, jealousy or competition but only a quiet calmness when they are around. You can be yourself and not worry about what they will think of you because they love you for who you are. The things that seem insignificant to most people such as a note, song or walk become invaluable treasures kept safe in your heart to cherish forever. Memories of your childhood come back and are so clear and vivid it’s like being young again. Colours seem brighter and more brilliant. Laughter seems part of daily life where before it was infrequent or didn’t exist at all. A phone call or two during the day helps to get you through a long day’s work and always brings a smile to your face. In their presence, there’s no need for continuous conversation, but you find you’re quite content in just having them nearby. Things that never interested you before become fascinating because you know they are important to this person who is so special to you. You think of this person on every occasion and in everything you do. Simple things bring them to mind like a pale blue sky, gentle wind or even a storm cloud on the horizon. You open your heart knowing that there’s a chance it may be broken one day and in opening your heart, you experience a love and joy that you never dreamed possible. You find that being vulnerable is the only way to allow your heart to feel true pleasure that’s so real it scares you. You find strength in knowing you have a true friend and possibly a soul mate who will remain loyal to the end. Life seems completely different, exciting and worthwhile. Your only hope and security is in knowing that they are a part of your life.
- Bob Marley
The course of true love never did run smooth.
- William Shakespeare (1564-1616), English playwright, poet
From A Midsummer Night's Dream
Act I, Scene l
Love is like the wind, you can't see it but you can feel it.
- Nicholas Sparks, (1965- ), American writer
From A Walk to Remember
You don't love someone because they're perfect, you love them in spite of the fact they're not.
- Jodi Picoult (1966- ), American author
From My Sister's Keeper
love is the voice under all silences,
the hope which has no opposite in fear,
the strength so strong mere force is feebleness:
the truth more first than the sun, more last than star
- E,E, Cummings (189 -1962), American poet, writer
From being to timelessness as it's to time
Love is an irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired.
- Robert Frost (1874-1963), American poet
As quoted in a review of A Swinger of Birches (1957) by Sydney Cox in Vermont History, Vol. 25 (1957), page 355
Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don't know how to replenish its source. It dies of blindness and errors and betrayals. It dies of illness and wounds; it dies of weariness, of witherings, of tarnishings.
- Anaïs Nin (1903-1977), author, born in France to Cuban parents
From Cities of the Ineriors
The Rose
Some say love, it is a river
That drowns the tender reed.
Some say love, it is a razor
That leaves your soul to bleed.
Some say love, it is a hunger,
An endless aching need.
I say love, it is a flower,
And you its only seed.
It's the heart afraid of breaking
That never learns to dance.
It's the dream afraid of waking
That never takes the chance.
It's the one who won't be taken,
Who cannot seem to give,
And the soul afraid of dyin'
That never learns to live.
When the night has been too lonely
And the road has been too long,
And you think that love is only
For the lucky and the strong,
Just remember in the winter
Far beneath the bitter snows
Lies the seed that with the sun's love
In the spring becomes the rose.
That drowns the tender reed.
Some say love, it is a razor
That leaves your soul to bleed.
Some say love, it is a hunger,
An endless aching need.
I say love, it is a flower,
And you its only seed.
It's the heart afraid of breaking
That never learns to dance.
It's the dream afraid of waking
That never takes the chance.
It's the one who won't be taken,
Who cannot seem to give,
And the soul afraid of dyin'
That never learns to live.
When the night has been too lonely
And the road has been too long,
And you think that love is only
For the lucky and the strong,
Just remember in the winter
Far beneath the bitter snows
Lies the seed that with the sun's love
In the spring becomes the rose.
- Lyrics by Bette Midler (1945- ), American singer, songwriter, actrees
- Joanne