Love can be pretty unrelenting. It's turgidity and its persistence can be intimidating to people who see it collapsing under its own weight and can't understand how it is still standing strong. People in love can separate without disengagement but equally they can continue loving with separation.   Anything anchored in emotion has moorings which may seem fragile but are often unrelenting. Nobody knows inner stories, of holding on to ties, of despair and of not giving up. Logic falls by the wayside.   Trouble starts when reconciliations are compromised without addressing the cause, the core of what eats away at the soul.   What draws people to each other is either what resonates or the things they miss in themselves. It's only later that the true differences of nature and thought get revealed. The sunken body of the iceberg can then be seen. And it is not always pleasant, and it often rests against the very grain of what the other stands for.   The true challenge of love starts there.   Because ignoring what haunts is to let our inner turmoil and resistance and unwilling consent keep eating the foundation like termite, even as the newly-painted facade of coupledom glistens in public glow.   If you liked this poem, consider listening to these other poems on ways of the resilience of love -  Marriage Made Me a Philosopher The Long Now of Us It Takes Time for Love to Find Comfort Subscribe to my newsletter 'The Uncuts' Follow me on Instagram at @sunilgivesup. Get in touch with me on [email protected]   The details of the music used in this episode are as follows - Imagefilm15 by Sascha Ende Link: https://filmmusic.io/en/song/Imagefilm15 Licence:  https://filmmusic.io/standard-license