:: how do I love thee? ::

in spring, a young [wo]man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. aka poetry.

today, I bring you my thoughts on elizabeth barrett browning's "how do I love thee" -- which was a poem I liked for a long time, but I think I love now.

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight

For the ends of Being, and ideal Grace.

I love thee to the level of every day's

Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.

I love thee freely, as men strive for right.

I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.

I love thee with the passion put to use

In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,

I shall but love thee better after death.

she wants to "count the ways", list inclusively, how she loves him. ...it's hard for me to choose which way to read it: personally, as from the author to her husband (she did write it personally; and it took her years to muster up the courage to give it to him), or impersonally, as some "she" to her "him". so I'll use pronouns, and you pick which you like better.

she begins the list. (it's easier to read without formatting.)

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach, when feeling out of sight for the ends of Being, and ideal Grace.

she loves him beyond what she merely sees, to the very edges of what she can feel -- and with her (farther-reaching) soul: to the very ends of her be-ing, her very existence, and as much as she can in as close to perfection as she has come. to clarify: she is not perfect, but as she reaches for perfection ("ideal Grace"), her love expands with that reaching -- always to her ultimate capacity.

that's pretty all-encompassing right there. but then she goes from the cosmic to the minuscule: "I love thee to the level of every day's most quiet need, by sun and candle-light." 

   light. what is more plebeian, taken for granted, and yet universally necessary? light keeps us alive; light allows us to then live productively; but it's a quiet need. we implicitly trust it will be there tomorrow -- and the day after -- and don't consider how necessary it is. she's realizing her need for him, though, and in a sweet understatement says she loves him as she loves her life; needs him as she needs the sun; a small statement. enormous in its implications.

she continues to describe the nature of her love: "freely, as men strive for Right." whatever our standards for right and wrong, we pursue what we think "Right" (good, best, correct) utterly, with our whole hearts. when I strive for something, I am throwing my whole self into obtaining that thing, not holding back. this is how she loves him: utterly. in abandon. without reserve. and she strives for him, pursues him, because he is her "Right".

true humility doesn't feel entitled; it says, "I am grateful for everything, because I don't deserve anything." when men "purely…turn from praise", they really believe they don't deserve it. (the key word here is purely.) 

   her love for him is of this same purity. she loves him unselfishly, not trying to get something back; she loves him humbly, not trying to prove her worth to him or get him to feel lucky. she feels lucky, because she can't believe that someone like her could ever be loved by someone like him. (NB: if both significant other and better half feel this way, you've got a recipe for a lasting relationship right there.)

from the nature of her love, she turns to the strength of it, beginning in childhood. first, she loves him "with the passion put to use in my old griefs". this implies two things to me: her feelings are strong. her feelings are lasting.

   the use of passion in context of "my old griefs" calls to mind a child whose emotions are wildly stirred up over an offense, and whose entire self is filled with it: thinking about it constantly, and even when time has passed, when they recall it, feeling the same emotion (sadness, anger) fill them just as potently. 

   and isn't it true that "old griefs" from when we were young are often fresher in memory that later ones? I remember with perfect clarity the time a "friend" of mine told me, laughing, that my teeth were so yellow! remembering even now gives me the same dead, sick feeling in my stomach and I blush. now. ten years later. 

   that whole-self passion of childhood is the strength with which she loves him, and her feelings aren't passing with time. she has invested all of her in loving him, as a child completely abandons rational thought, to unreasoningly lose herself in focusing on him. 

   but if "griefs" is too negative a picture, she continues with softer feelings -- "and with my childhood's faith". the simplicity and innocent trust of children is proverbial: children accept things as so because they're so. there is no suspicion in a child. they hear a statement made, and they believe it, because it was stated; without looking for innuendoes or deeper meanings, or even demanding complete understanding before they accept it. 

   she simply loves him. she doesn't look for why or how or what is love, anyway? she has no ulterior motive. she has no schedule or plan or explanation; it just is. and that's fine with her. 

the next stage of her love's strength is in adolescence, when our "childhood's faith" in our heroes, our saints, is sometimes dashed. her "lost saints", fallen from their pedestals, first taught her cynicism and seemed to kill the whole-hearted, simple love (admiration? hero-worship?) she'd been able to have. now it has returned, and she can look up to him without worrying he won't come through, since he has proven her trust. (well, she doesn't say that. but if you read this personally, the brownings did stay married, and she obviously thought he was The Best Thing Since Sliced Bread, so I'm speculating the teeniest bit. it's called the Poetic Interpretation License, which really is a thing. my thing.)

"I love thee with the breath, smiles, tears of all my life." it's like she's run out of words, out of meaningful comparisons and similes and she has to wave her arms around and say, "just… EVERYTHING, okay? I love you with EVERYTHING!" she feels her love so much that she can't really express it (although so far she's done a better job than I could ever do). with all of her, her childhood, her growing-up, what made and does make her who she is, she loves him.

in the last line, she sums it all up. she's talked about the love coming, absorbing her whole life from childhood to now, and then she looks to the end of her life.
   her love, she's already said, isn't the flame of a heart that burns hot but wastes away to ashes. this love  will quietly but completely last for the rest of her life; and, she hopes -- prays -- believes -- even beyond it. she loves him imperfectly on this earth, but will be wholly perfected after death: and then her love for him will become perfect.