Prologue
Before you start reading these poems, I want you to forget what you mean by love.
Love is not just a feeling between two people who happened to cross paths and somehow fell for each other. It's not always romantic. It doesn't have to be romantic to be meaningful.
These poems show the different kinds of love. They are not based on just the romantic ones. Love can be between anyone. A mother loves her child, a friend loves a friend, a sister loves a brother, a lover loves a lover, or how a stranger loves someone who passed a few acts of kindness to them.
These are all different kinds of love.
There is love in wishing someone would come back, even when you know that they never will.
There is love in wishing someone stays safe and healthy.
There is love in caring.
There is love in hoping.
It exists somewhere within us when we feel bad for someone's suffering, when we forgive someone, or when we owe someone nothing but still ask, “Are you okay?”
Humans are naturally wired to be selfish. We protect ourselves, use others, put ourselves first, and sometimes hurt others. But somehow, love still makes us care for someone without thinking about ourselves, makes their happiness mean as much to us as ours does. This makes it one of the most beautiful things someone has ever felt.
Love has the power to change the world.
Wars break out when we forget that the people on the other side are humans too and that they feel as much pain as we do. Hatred grows when we stop seeing each other as people and forget that we are all God's children. Poverty grows when we stop caring about others' suffering.
The world already has a lot of violence and hatred. It doesn't need any more of it.
As love transcends every boundary, be it religion, caste, race, skin tone, or country, the world needs love.
Love that can beat violence.
Love that realises that the people on the other side are humans too.
Love that forgives.
Love that forgets.
Love that heals.
