The Nature of Love

It is alluring how our bodies fit together like pieces of a puzzle. The head nestles effortlessly against the curve of a shoulder. Arms wrap gently around necks. Hands and fingers intertwined without challenge.

Our minds also have an odd partnership. Tearing up when another is crying, being understanding of one's pain and sorrow, and simply finishing each other sentences.

These are the puzzle pieces of love. Each aspect of the big picture can be found practically anywhere. Possibly at the bottom of a lake where Koi fish swim in the cool water each with a unique fin or a distinct scale. Still their coral spots are blurred through the bubbles they create with their delicate tales, forming a vibrate watercolor of apricot orange.

Maybe love is found in a frigid woodland where snowflakes fall from the clouds. Each with an exclusive icy detail or a different story, yet every snowy fragment layers together to dust the evergreen trees or coat the earth with a winter blanket. Or the stars in the darken sky worshipping the moon with their fiery glow. All with varying luminosity and all lightyears apart, yet each shining freckle in the deep indigo atmosphere, twinkles collectively creating constellations.

Soulmates discover these constellations as they are cuddled next to each other on top of her grandmother's quilt. An empty picnic basket sits on the corner of the stitched fabric patches. Except for the sound of the few green grapes being carried away by a colony of ants, the world around them is silent. The hushed earth allows the melodic rhythm of their heartbeats to echo resoundingly between their fingers. The tickle of the dewy grass reminds him of the itch in the pit of his stomach to confess the three sacred words. The butterflies flap their wings within his core as the words roll off his tongue, bounce off of his blushed lips, and turn through space searching for an ear to land in.

“...I love you...”

Her brain registers the words and the serotonin releases through her blood vessels, surges through her veins, and arrives at her thumping heart.

Maybe love is a puzzle with each piece of affection fitting together to create the perception of love. Perhaps love is a set of dominos with each falling ivory slab the next falls along with it until the pattern is completed. For that I know, love could even be a game of chess. The outcome is inevitable but it is up to the players to figure out which pawn belongs on which checkered square.

No one will ever know the answer for certain, that is why we refer to the concept of intimacy as the mystery of love.