We all have felt love before. It is sweet and nice to love and be loved. Except that our reasons for love and the objects of our love are definitely different. Some people love persons, but others love things, games and sports. There are animal lovers too. The subject of love is as delicate as it could be. Love is one of the most talked about subject anywhere in the world, even though, the interpretations might be different. Love one another, we hear. Let there be love among you. Love your neighbour as yourself, is common in the world’s vocabulary. However, just as we are all different in many, many ways, we sense and feel love much in the same way. But by and large, love is that expressive, often overpowering, lingering and emotionally numbing, but ironically explosive sensation you often feel for someone or something. It is the emotional longing and possessive feeling you have for someone or a thing. It is one of the strong, if not the strongest emotions of our human experience. Love, can immobilize your ability to reason, and sometimes makes you do things you probably wouldn’t do if you were offered the whole world. People fall in love every minute, everyday. I have heard one argument which holds that, one ought not to fall in love, but walk into it. You hear this statement often when sweet love turns sour – something love always does, even for some of the most passionate. You are a man. You see that beautiful woman. Her beauty as far as you are concerned is incomparable. You feel that strong urge to possess her. The feeling could be so strong that you get lost in a world of your own. You create this world for just the two of you. She is beautiful, and you want her for yourself. Any other competitor for the prize of your heart is a threat. A threat, an obstacle that must in some cases be cleared by any means possible. And perceived obstacles to love are sometimes cleared in the cruelest manner, just so you can get to experience and actualize your love. There you are, standing before her, so consumed by that thing called love. As you look into her eyes, you get the adrenalin rush. Your stomach churns and your heart beats faster. Sometimes a certain part of your anatomy would begin to throb, making you feel a sense of embarrassment – it happens, whether you are a man or a woman, that part of the body throbs! But that’s what this thing called love could do to you. You could even be called crazy for being in love. Especially, if you are a young lady, full of promise and from a ‘good’ and prestigious home. But your pick for love is the palm-wine taper’s son. Then you must be crazy. Love has gone into your head. It has infected your brains and eventually blinded you. Now you can’t see. You can’t see what is good for you. So, you got it all wrong, your choice is not the best. But as it is your defence would be that you are consumed by love! Looks like love could be a consuming fire, a merciless raging fire that consumes every bit of reasonableness in its path. Come to think of it, the married are expected to be the finest example of two people in love. They ought to be because by tying the knot, they have publicly declared their love, telling every one else that they want to share their love together; just the two of them. But we have seen and continue to see that even the most beautiful couple fall out of love. Just check the records of the family courts. Couples divorce everyday. So, what has happened to love? Especially, love that lights up at the resumption of a relationship. Does it die? May be it dies. But in the beginning lovers are always unstoppable. Nothing could come between people in the early stages of their love affair. Not even when the whole world comes against them. They would not budge. They call it heels over head in love. People have even vowed, made covenants to stay in love forever - till death. Yet some break their vows, they fall out of love as swiftly as they fell in. And when they do, it is because they are loving someone else. The other lover is ditched, abandoned and left heart-broken – all in the name of love. I remember this incident that stayed with my memory for a while. Kwame is my very good friend, so good that we shared so much with each other. He loved Priscilla. At least so we all thought. But one evening he came banging at my door. He was furious, confused and restless. “What is it?,” I asked him. “It is Priscilla”, he told me. “What about her?” came my immediate follow up question. “She wants out of the relationship”, he cried. As he spoke, I noticed a tear dropping out of his left eye slowly down his cheeks. It was the first time I had seen him cry, and the first time my friend cried before me, he cried because of love. It is hard to believe what love is capable of doing to the most religious and ardent observer of traditions. Some people are known to have thrown caution to the wind, shown disregard to binding rules and regulations guiding their conduct and rules to which they have consistently subjected themselves, to act in absolutely disgusting ways in the name of love. Some people, both men and women have also been known to have given some of the most expensive gifts to people they loved. Men have bought houses, sports cars and sometimes, out of this world gifts to their lovers. Some women have also been known to have done the same. Give expensive gifts to the men they love. Meanwhile, some women would attempt to disfigure other women because they suspected them of interfering with their love. Some men may even kill and some have been reported to have killed other men for tampering with the object of their love. That’s how strong love could be, or is it? I have heard it being said elsewhere that if you love someone, you love them so much that you could let them go, if they want to. But do we? It has also been said that love is ‘Agape’, or sacrificial. It gives without expecting anything in return. It is patient, longsuffering and does not pay back wrong doing. Love is also said to be ‘Filial’, that is to say love is relational. It is motherly, fatherly, brotherly and sisterly. It is the feeling of devotion we have towards our blood relations. It is the feeling that makes you feel attached to your relatives and then also makes you want to make sacrifices for their well being. It endorses your sense of belonging to a family. It is also the seal of friendship; platonic friendship. And then we are told that love can be ‘Eros’ or romantic. It is the expression of love that is physical. It goes beyond being fond of someone and crosses all boundaries of privacy. It is the expression of love that lets go. It involves consummation. And it has been said that this is the most delicate function of love, because when expressed without care and a good sense of judgement, it leads to pain and sometimes the pain can be very excruciating. Expressing, sharing and falling in love is very much part of our humanity. Love has built nations, but then again it is love that had destroyed some nations. I think love is a mystery. A mystery far beyond human comprehension, no one has been able to fully grasp the nature and meaning of love. But to me, this thing called love is the most beautiful expressive aspect of the human emotion, when it is shown in the right manner, with the right person and at what can aptly be considered the right time. And the beauty of love comes forth strongly when it is expressed unconditionally. Authored by: Emmanuel K. Dogbevi E-mail: edogbevi@hotmail.com