The Simplicity of Love (Diotima in Plato’s Symposium: 210a-212c)

Love, Socrates？
It is wanting to be reborn
not as yourself,
but as the object of your own desire--
and what you see
in the eyes of the beloved
squinting through kisses for
the truth on your lips.

It comes to you
in flashes and dreams
that leave you drenched
in sweat, even in winter:
and what you feel is the
end of feeling,
the closing of eyes
—your eyes, yes
and the eyes in which you have seen
the beauty of a new soul,
in which you have
seen a nest of birds
hatched out in April,
a wave regathering itself
to rush back into the sea,
the young man in the tomb
saying He is not here,
the parched earth
receiving rain with an open throat.
It is only seen
in the eyes of another
where it is wrapped
in memories that existed
before you sucked a breast,
ideas that resonated
though the spheres
before your ears were formed,
humanity raised
from the shadows
to beauty and music.
It is the lesser mystery of the highest good.