Walking the Tuileries gardens in Paris, one of the most romantic and beautiful things for me is the Auguste Rodin’s bronze statue The Kiss. It’s always fascinated me how he masterfully was able to capture such sensitivity within the working of bronze and marble, and how the emotions and romance still come alive and almost move even within the hardiness. How can marble, how can bronze be so tender and so moving?
For those who don’t know, The Kiss portrays the two star crossed lovers Paolo and Francesca from Dante’s Divine Comedy, though both the lovers were actually real people who lived in the 13th century. In Dante’s Divine Comedy, we see how Dante the pilgrim wonders the otherworlds, and in one of the circles sees two figures who are so closely and tied together, embraced and enwrapped, they are flying as one. These are the souls of Francesca and Paolo; and Francesca tells Dante of their love story, sharing that the beginning of their love was when she “was kissed by so great a lover, he, who will never be separated from me, kissed my mouth, all trembling.”
Just like a beautiful sculpture that stands the test of time, love is a marriage between will and grace. The grace to bring the two people together, so that their starry paths meet and they are able to kiss with human lips; and the will of their hands and efforts and every day gestures to go the distance and actually make their relationship work and last.
The beloved is a gift of God, and such loves are blessed indeed, giving us the feeling of our meant to be, our destiny aligning. And when you meet your one, it can seem like you are truly blessed and you can both go through any obstacles together, whether financial, emotional or physical; because what holds you in something greater, something spiritual, something from a time before time beyond time.
And while grace has blessed us, the path doesn’t stop there, and all thereafter is our own choices. Like a sculptor we’ll need to put in the effort, refine the edges, and devote to this – to what we are creating; and we need to nourish it, tend to it, care for it, pay attention to it, not just sometimes but always. We need to be an always, not just sometimes; we need to show up not just when it’s convenient but always.
The secret ingredient to love and all great relationships is having good relationship skills. This means emotional maturity, ability to self reflect, responsibility and self accountability, trust and being trustworthy, integrity and respect, selflessness, compassion and kindness, openness and intentional listening, and understanding of one another and how you can navigate through conflict or misunderstandings and settle into peace and harmony, and finding your way back to each other.
There are clocks beyond the hands of our human made clocks, unstrikable and unclokable by us; there, time is a matter of timing. But when it’s time, it’s time. Love will happen when it happens, and you’ll meet who you are meant to. All thereafter is your own will, and your mutual wills, and your hands and footsteps and lips and ordinary every day gestures along the circling staircases of life. This is what will shape your path. This is what will create the soil and what is created in and of your love lands.
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