Amorem Mensuravimus

Beloveds, Beloved, Beloveds

Beloveds,
you who claim to love—
By what measure shall love be known?

Give us a measure,
Dear Master of Love
and we shall measure our own.

Is love the number of gifts you give?
Then the richest heart loves best.

And one who owns no gift but time?
Perhaps that heart gives no less.

Then can you count what love is worth?
No number answers the question.

Is love how far you follow?
We would follow beyond the sea.

If love commands you lose yourself,
Is following love—or captivity?

Love walks beside the beloved.
It does not demand a shadow.

Amorem mensuravi?

We measured—and the measure broke.

Amorem mensuravi?

We named it—and the silence spoke.

No ruler spans the human heart,
No scale can weigh what passes through us.
We know the measure only when
love does not diminish us.

Is love the pain you will endure?
The deepest wound must prove it true.

If suffering alone proves love,
Does cruelty become a virtue?

No, Master. Pain is not devotion.
A wound is neither vow nor sign.

Then what may one surrender?
Pride—but not the self entire.

Is love the length of your remaining?
Love is never turning away.

And if remaining turns to ruin?
Then leaving may be love that day.

Does love endure by standing still?
No. Love must move and still be chosen.

What opens the guarded chamber?
Intimacy.

What sets the blood alight?
Passion.

What wakes when the flame is quiet?
Commitment.

Which one alone is love?
None alone—and not all always.

Then you remain uncertain?
We are nearer now than knowledge.

Amorem mensuravi?
We measured—and the measure broke.

Amorem mensuravi?
We listened—and the silence spoke.

No ruler spans the human heart,
No scale can weigh what passes through us.
We know the measure only when
,ove does not diminish us.

When no one sees, what does love do?
It notices.

When the beloved speaks in fear?
It listens.

When desire and freedom disagree?
It does not make a prison.

When the ordinary morning comes?
It chooses—and is chosen.

And when it cannot heal the wound?
It stays near without claiming power.

And what does love ask in return?
Not less of either soul.

Beloveds, have you measured love?

We measured gifts,
But love was in the giving.

We measured years,
But love was in the living.

We measured wounds,
But love was in the healing.

We measured words,
But love was in the meaning.

Then speak the lesson.

Love is not the measure
of how much of me must disappear.

Love is the sacred distance
in which two souls may both draw near.

And who, at last, was measured?

We were.

Amorem mensuravimus—
We measured love,
And love revealed our measure.