Even The Poets Dare Not Dream About It

How strange is it that a single emotion can be the cause of so many other feelings, on completely different ends of the emotional spectrum?

One moment you can feel like the world is passing you by, leaving you alone in a sea of doubt, and no matter how hard you try to stay afloat, there is a sinking feeling in your soul as hopelessness slowly sets in. The next thing you know, you've found that ultimate desire, that one thing you've searched for your entire life, that one missing element that completes you, your world is brighter and it seems like Heaven has truly found it's place on Earth, at least for you. Then, like some inevitable antagonist, the poison slowly works it's way into your life again, eating away at all you hold dare. When you finally recover from being hit across the face by fate, you find yourself looking back out upon that sea of doubt once more (wow that is one large ocean).

A single emotion, part of an unlimited palette of different feelings a person can have in their lifetime. While other feelings, other experiences, fade away, finding their home in the distant memories of a long life, this one never falters, and once you feel it, it forever boils at the surface of your consciousness, bringing forth every other feeling along with it.

Some people renounce it, claim life is easier without the trials involved, turning their backs on something they believe causes more harm then good in the end. Others beg for the opportunity, believing that they are missing out on the greatest gift we have to give, forever hoping for it to finds it's way into their lives. It seems that no two people can completely agree on how to handle it, yet in one way or another, we've all experienced it.

Think of it like that perennial plant you'll ultimately find yourself purchasing this spring for one reason or another:

You'll choose it from what seems like an endless amount of similar choices. You'll turn it around in your hands, unfairly comparing it to every other plant at the flower shop. You'll probably pay more for it then you were planning, but when you take it home, it will look perfect in it's designated location. You'll take care of it, glancing at it when you feel like it, to help cheer you up, to get you through another day in this world. It will bloom, bringing brightness to your life, and when you look at it, you'll smile. Then one day, you'll take it for granted, you'll forget to give it the attention it needs to survive (maybe something else in life grab your attention and became a new priority), but the plant will wither and go limp. Oh you'll try to water it again, re-pot it, give it food, but it will just turn brown and die. Without another choice and all that remorse, you'll take the bulb from the pot and throw it in the ground under the tree in the backyard, forgetting about it while life continues to sweep you up in other experiences. One day you'll be sitting out in the backyard, looking at that tree, reminiscing about the past, but losing all the details in translation, and you'll see that sprout....and you'll remember again. You'll go out there every day to check on it, to hope. Slowly your attention will be rewarded with a new plant, bigger and stronger then when you first bought it, it will reach for the sky, and bring joy and happiness. Yet each time it will ultimately die with the first frost. How strange that it seems to take so much punishment, but always returns again, stronger then it was at first.

It is a tricky word, it means so much to so many people. There are a million ways to describe it, and yet it seems so powerful at times, that it will go places that even poets dare not dream of. However, be careful, although it holds ultimate power of those that bow to it's influence, it can bring pain that may seem unbearable, and cause a wound to open, that may never heal.