A Deep Dive into poem, Love As The Lesson, by Everkesia Taylor
Everkesia Taylor's poem Love As The Lesson is a raw, honest exploration of love's multifaceted nature. The poem intricately details the ways love can shape, challenge, and transform us. Through vivid and often startling imagery, Everkesia captures love's dual capacity to inflict pain and foster growth, presenting it as both a teacher and a healer.
The Agony of Learning
The poem opens with a powerful metaphor: "Love / Like chalk on a board / Scrapping until I cringe." This image is sharp and unsettling, immediately drawing the reader into the discomfort and pain that can accompany love. The sound of chalk scraping, something we associate with irritation, mirrors the way love sometimes forces us to confront difficult truths or painful experiences. Everkesia describes love as something "being tooled as a means to teach," suggesting that love is an instrument of learning—often harsh, but ultimately instructive.
Resilience Through Pain
Everkesia then shifts to the image of falling off a bicycle, an experience that is universally relatable. "Turning that fear / Into courage to get back on again" symbolizes the resilience that love demands. Despite the pain and the tears—"you bled & you cried"—there is healing. This section of the poem speaks to the way love requires us to be brave, to face our fears, and to continue moving forward even when we’ve been hurt.
Stripping Away the Masks
In one of the most intense sections of the poem, Everkesia compares love to "a scalpel to skin," describing the painful process of cutting away the masks we create to protect ourselves. The scalpel, typically associated with surgery, implies precision and necessity, suggesting that love can compel us to remove our defenses and expose our true selves. The idea of "Cutting the mask you made / To protect yourself" reflects the vulnerability that love often demands, urging us to confront our deepest insecurities and fears.
From Destruction to Growth
The poem’s imagery intensifies with "flames to your hair" and "a bed of fire," which represent self-destructive tendencies fueled by insecurities, doubts, and past traumas. Yet, even in this destruction, Everkesia finds a path to healing. Love "poured water onto your head / Extinguished the flames," symbolizing love's ability to nurture and restore us. The poem beautifully captures the cycle of destruction and renewal, as "pedals grew / From where the burns were," signifying new life and growth emerging from past pain.
Empowerment and Self-Realization
As the poem progresses, Everkesia portrays love as a force that pulls us out of ourselves, offering us vision, purpose, and strength. "Love / Pulled your head from your chest," metaphorically lifting us out of self-centeredness and into a place of clarity and empowerment. The repeated phrase "Gave you" emphasizes love's role in bestowing gifts of courage, power, and self-awareness, ultimately leading to the rediscovery of oneself—"Gave you, you again."
Love's Harsh Lessons
The closing stanzas of the poem return to the theme of love as a harsh but necessary teacher. Love "Knocked you off of your feet / And kept you there…for a while," suggesting that love can be humbling and force us to confront our shortcomings, such as emotional immaturity, ego, and the desire to control. Everkesia acknowledges that love can be something we take for granted, leading to loss and regret. Yet, even in these moments of failure, love continues to teach us, bringing the poem full circle with the return of the chalk metaphor: "As you cringe from the scrapping of chalk / On a board as you feel the disruption of its breaking body being used a means to teach…you…love."
Conclusion
Love As The Lesson by Everkesia Taylor is a powerful and evocative exploration of the complexities of love. Through its vivid imagery and candid reflections, the poem delves into love's capacity to hurt and heal, to challenge and empower. Everkesia’s work serves as a reminder that love, in all its forms, is a profound teacher—one that shapes us through both pain and joy, ultimately leading us to a deeper understanding of ourselves and the world around us.
Books by Everkesia Taylor are available on Amazon and www.iampoetry.shop