It Is What It Is by Lisa Zaran
Love does not seek indulgence
nor walk with trepidation
but springs up unrestrained.
Love holds a greater truth
telling us do not take your life
but give it to someone else.
Love does not collect ashes
or hold memorials at our gravesites.
Nor does it grieve.
Love simply is.
Love is not a profession.
It holds no private ceremony
including some, excluding others.
Perhaps the love of the beloved
is not so much a gift as an indestructible
birthright.
It holds no vengeance, can not be earned
in a dream. Can not be barred in protest.
Is not a testimony for living a clean life.
Love is what it is.
Barring confusion, that potters field,
barring denial, that broken tooth
or contention, that dead end road.
Love is what it is.
Knows what it knows.
Is what it eats, chews and swallows
the same as it speaks and breathes.
Knows no fathom. Exhibits no sorrow.
Possesses nothing, while giving expects
nothing in return.
Lisa Zaran is an American poet, essayist, occasional interviewer and the author of six collections. Her first book, the sometimes girl, was recently the focus of a year long translation course in Germany. She is the founder and editor of Contemporary American Voices, an online journal of poetry, which has now been approved to be used as the subject of study for a translation course in Germany.
