So what is love, she asks,
As if there is an answer
What is love,
To you, is what she means,
So I tell her –

Love is the only thing you can give away
And receive back more, the more you give,
Love is caring about someone else’s happiness
More than your own, wishing them well
Even if it poisons your soul to watch them smile
The green demon of envy reminding you that you are not only human,
But partially, at least partially, ugly inside, like all the rest.

Love is what you do when you have nowhere else to go,
No tree to hide behind, no road to run down, nowhere to escape.

Love is what you do when all else is lost,
And you realise that time itself is a mystery,
Not flowing forwards and backwards through space
With you in tow, like you were trained to believe
All those years ago, in school, through life, in memory
You realise life and time are intertwined
As is love, the memory found of some lost scent
Some distant song, come back to haunt you
From somewhere deep down, a place you thought you lost, for once
For ever, never to find, but in love, now
As you once were.

I could explain all of this, but stick to banalities,
For banalities are all I can think of, as love
Coursing through my veins takes my head and spins it round
Rises my gut and the pulse that comes from within
Spits in my face the steam of lost thoughts and broken dreams
And reminds me that, once again, I am no more
No less
Than everyone else.