Love doesn’t make a theatrical entry, and it doesn’t require linguistic scaffolding to keep it alive. It breathes softly under the ribs. Diffuses through gestures. So silently that a world not paying attention would miss it. However, in these tiny interactions, whole constellations of meaning hide beneath them.
Such an uncontaminated feeling cannot endure theatricalism. When love is practiced and given away half-heartedly, coated with ingenuity, it sails like a hollow shell. In these cases, words are like polished marble, which is impressive in form. But cold in nature. The receiver intuitively feels the vacancy. Human perception has a subtle sense of authenticity. They can feel the shallowness in a touch. The hesitation in a look. The warmth or coldness in a closeness. Language, in this case, can be deceptive, but the body tells everything way before even the sentences end.
Love does not require volume. It thrives within restraint. The slight squeeze of hands around one another expresses a plethora of emotions. Even a half-second delay in blinking has more conviction than a paragraph that has been written just for the show. If the emotions are genuine, the comfortable silence between two people is also a sign of intimacy.
There is an odd modesty in true love. Love pervades in the most mundane things – stirring a cup of tea with cautious attention, straightening out a collar just before a person enters the room, standing next to the other person in an “ordinary” afternoon. These gestures can seem banal. But they are vibrating with a force that cannot be measured. Their worth is in their delicacy.
Inauthentic love fails in its own expression. It sets up sententious phrases with the hope for a response. The lack of resonance makes such expressions empty. The receiver can nod. He or she can even smile. But there is still some emptiness inside. True love does not need any form of performance. It flows with instinct, which does not require words.
Think of the embrace at a door in a careless way. Arms are embraced, breath is mixed, and then it is separated. The gesture says, without words, “You are in my consciousness, and I am in yours.”
There is a feeling of warmth, clarity, and ease of being. Grand speeches are forgotten. The fragments that are remembered are the exchange of glances in a room full of people. A shoulder to lean on in weariness. And an assuring smile which needed no description.
Real love likes discretion. It believes that what is strongly felt will be strongly perceived. It does not demand repetition and confirmation. It is just there. Radiant and not imposed. It is shown by the tiniest movements like a blink, a touch, a silent proximity that speaks volumes without a word.