I wanted to be able to put what I feel into words. I wanted to sit down and, Ovid-like, pump out beautiful, metrically correct, witty, charming verse in praise of the one I love.

Words. I wanted to give you words.

But it's beyond words. There is nothing to be said that I haven't already said a thousand times, nothing beyond saying I love you, and knowing that I mean it in the most absolute way, and being sure beyond any doubting that you love me just the same.

I. First person singular pronoun reflecting the speaker as a participant in the action to be described.

Love. First person singular present active verb, to adore, to worship, to revere, to cherish, to feel warm, positive emotions without relent even during the darkest moments.

You. Second person singular pronoun, the subject and recipient of love. More than that, happily, the returner of my love with her's. Mine.

Grammar makes me happy, and I can lose myself for hours in the complexities of syntax, morphology, etymology, semantics, conjugations and declensions. Language makes me happier still, I can lose myself for a lifetime in reading and listening, speaking and writing, trying to find the perfect way to express every thought that comes to me.

I once wrote that "without the cage of language to contain it, perception is unlimited. Yet without the structure of language to communicate it, perception cannot transcend subjectivity." I never knew then, that something could be at once beyond perception and beyond language. I was unaware that there was a love that could not be articulated, could not even be accurately perceived, that was just simply known, right in the core of one's being. Now I do, and I am a wiser man.

I love you, my pet. Those are the only words I can really give you- but they are the most important, and the most precious of all.


"And when he has brought forth and reared this perfect virtue, he shall be called the friend of god, and if ever it is given to man to put on immortality, it shall be given to him." - Plato.