Bella Imperia: The things I don’t say

Who believes in love?

Who, in a world sharpened by disappointment, still dares to place faith in something so fragile and unruly? Who still opens the door after it has been slammed shut? Who still reaches out after their hands have come back empty?

Why believe in love at all?

Love has made fools of the wise and beggars of the proud. It has reduced the strongest among us to sleepless nights, trembling hands, and tears shed in the dark where no one can witness them. Love has a talent for exposing every soft place we try so desperately to hide. It finds the cracks in our armor and slips itself inside, only to leave us wondering why we ever thought ourselves invincible.

Why keep believing in it? Why keep returning to the fire after being burned? Why keep trusting what has wounded you more than once?

Perhaps because love, despite all the pain it carries, remains one of the few things that makes this life feel larger than survival. It is reckless, yes. Illogical, certainly. It asks too much and guarantees nothing. It can turn devotion into grief in the span of a heartbeat. It can make a person wait too long, forgive too much, and hope beyond reason.

And still… we return to it.

We are impossible creatures. Impossibly tender. Impossibly stubborn. We swear we are done, that this time the hurt has hardened us, that this time we have learned. Yet somewhere inside us, beneath the bruises and cynicism, something stubbornly continues to bloom. Some small, foolish part of us still wants to believe there is goodness worth giving ourselves to.

Maybe that is madness. Maybe it is weakness. Or maybe it is courage in its most uncelebrated form.

To love again after heartbreak is no small act. To remain soft in a world that rewards coldness is no small act. To keep believing there is beauty in connection after being shown ugliness is no small act.

So yes, perhaps the world is full of zanies and fools. Dewy-eyed dopes and hopeless romantics stumbling through disappointment with flowers in their hands. Perhaps I am one of them too.

Because even though it hurts, even though love has left scars where promises used to be, I still find myself unable to despise it. I still find myself hoping. I still find myself loving.

And maybe that makes me foolish.

But I think there are worse things to be than a fool who still believes in love.

-Bella Imperia