Love

---

The only unconditional love

comes from parents.

I lost mine.

Had to look for love

in conditional places.

---

Everything else

is transaction.

They call it love,

but it has agendas,

takes at least as much

as it gives.

---

Unconditional love

doesn’t bargain.

I came close once…

but even that

found its limits.

---

We use one word

for different things.

Parental love…

if real…

asks nothing back.

Partner love

always has terms.

Yet we call them both

love.

---

Maybe deliberately.

Society needs the blur…

needs us to think

the transaction

is devotion.

Marriage, family, stability…

built on confusing

what’s freely given

with what’s negotiated.

---

So why chase it?

Knowing the conditions.

Knowing the deal.

---

Because the universe

doesn’t care.

The vastness is indifferent.

Every person is alone.

---

And the only thing

that makes any of this

worthwhile

is each other…

finding the one

who makes life

less alone

than anyone else.

---

Not unconditional.

Not eternal.

Just worth it.

- UpsilonA