The Original Jab

Poemata LIV

“Psyche Revived by Cupid’s Kiss” by Antonio Canova, 1787. Bow-and-arrow optional in the Old Days.

Some ask what it is to fall in love
Hoping to learn some secret trick
Romantic love, they're thinking of
The first "cure" to make you sick;
The troubadour, the story goes
Taught courtly love, but as a joke
A serious joke? No-one knows--
The ages are a darkening cloak;
In the days of Europe's summertime
Before the sun of Christ had set
Such lovesick ways could be a crime
Or an illness and breed regret;
Let it be known they spoke the truth
Such romance is a sickness dire
"Love is Love" say those uncouth
Who from the same may soon expire;
Cupid's bow, a sort of jab
Causes hearts to work amiss
As though blind in darkness grab
For anything to touch, to kiss;
But we who suffered in this way
Should not advise for others too
To seek this sickness, but to stay
To their own real precepts true;
And not bet all for losing's sake
On inoculations strange
From a common coldness take
An innocence to re-arrange;
For hatred and love are here the same
Heartbreak and loneliness await
Jealousy and lust, how could we name
"Love" this thing we come to hate?
Some must go this path alas
Into a pit unseen above--
For rest, do not trespass!
For this it is to fall in love.