I gather them around. Reluctantly, they were herded uphill. Alienated, unable to speak, they got softer. Long ago I learned the hard way that privation acted marvels on the reluctant. They never were the sharpest knives in the block but, after the second day on the path, they all knew...
We reached the summit, it was a small place on the top of the world. I sat down, closed my eyes, let them roam free. I herded them back and produced the question: What is love? One by one they answered back...
The first one, unable to speak, touched my hands... I found myself submerged in a strange wave of warmth. My skin crawled. My heart sank. The entrails that filled my torso vanished and the warmth, so real, so solid, took their place. The sun, the earth, the little one embraced, and overwhelm, me.
After I recover, the time for the second one came, this one has always displeased me the most, he talked about gifts, wealth, a procession of gimme gimmes. I was about to struck him with the whole of my rage when he shut up on his own and told me... Love is time, the time you gather to run away from your job to go on vacations with the family, to relax and sit down at the movies, to read an old story that tells about you and me, to teach you how to transform the world around you with your hands, to ride a bike, to go fishing. Love is time, which most people thing there is little, finite and priceless.
I came to the third confused. I never expected that from the brat. I sat down with this one, always closer but isolated. Love, he told me, is an absolute. We shall never find Love, but the imperfect shadow of it, love. Depending on you or me it will cloud ones mind or be an eye-opener; whichever love comes to be, Love will always be an enigma to both of us. You could choose from Saul/Paul to Heinlin's definition, and it will never be close to Love. So, what's your point?
I came decided to leave alone, I had to remind myself while brought forth the fourth.
Love? There's no love. There is us, pity human beings in need of support, acceptance, attention, and whatnot. He had a hard face, but sad eyes. I couldn't help but get him closer and dive into his memories, otherwise nothing would be gained from the exercise. I saw it, like a moving picture, love was a parking lot with her leaving for humanitarian job and sure that it will be the end, that she will came changed. Love was telling her how stupid she was for trying to leave the one that loved her truly and deeply because she was afraid. It was too weird to see that love was being, being there, no matter how much it hurt, being there to do what was right for the loved ones. So, there was love... and hate... I saw all the frustration grow and take root to give ripe hate... it seems that for this one there's such a thing as one too many...
I got to the last one tired... Have you let home for long and came back to see your mother hands, which used to look like yours look now, covered in liver spots, the skin looking so thin that you think it may break, still strong and lively when hugging you to welcome you home? Those hands are love, changed, but the same. Have you ever found yourself talking for hours, planning, laughing, fooling around with someone half a world away? Well, that's love. Have you ever found yourself sitting the long wait waiting for the flames to bring family to the netherworld with a strong arm offered by those that you never thought would be there? Well, that's love. All of them are right and wrong. In the end, love is and you, my friend, are.
I came to the hill to throw them away, to shed the burden off my shoulders... we came down the hill together, a whole, being one.
In the end, love is and I am.
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