how do you know you’re loved?

It’s easy to miss. Love, I mean.

We grow up thinking it’s supposed to look like fireworks when you kiss or confessions with boomboxes.
But maybe love isn’t loud. Maybe it doesn’t knock on your door with a bouquet, a book and an Atif Aslam playlist (although, that sounds magical).
Maybe it tiptoes in, like a the cold breeze on a warm day.

It doesn’t have to be glamorous, maybe it lives in moments you shrugged as ordinary. Maybe it is the ordinary.

Is it in the way your dad buys you junk food when you have a big day ahead,
as it’s his way of saying, I’m rooting for you?

Is it the way your friend boils extra hot water for you
because she knows you love it?
The way your dogs lick your face every time you come home?

Is it the way your friends check in
when they think you’re not okay—
even if you’ve left every message on read,
and curled yourself into isolation?

Is it your brother, fists clenched,
saying “I’ll beat that motherfucker up”
just because someone made you feel a little uncomfortable?
Is it the friends who surprise you
with cake and pretty flowers,
because they thought you’ll like it?

Or is it in the way your mum
buys you the very snacks she scolds you for.

Maybe love is a hand that finds yours while crossing the road
because they know you’re scared.
Or the friend who randomly show up to your doorstep
because they know you want to see them
but don’t want to ask and burden them.

Or your sister calling from another continent
just to tell you a dumb update that didn’t matter
because she misses you telling her real stuff going on in your life.

Is love in the flowers and the cheesecakes?
Or is love in the forehead kisses and warm hugs?
Or maybe its in the the deep conversations over hard liquor and hot fries.

Maybe—
just maybe—
love is in the way you see yourself in the mirror everyday and say you can do it, even if it burns a part of you, because you get to spend time with those you love.

To be loved
isn’t just respect and infatuation—
it’s to be known, felt and understood. Even in your darkest days.

Love is not always poetic.
Sometimes it’s hot cheese momos,
a 10 pm FaceTime,
a handwritten letter.
and sometimes,
the magic is in everything you love too.