A Love Poem for a Friend~(A poem about true love)

I am your friend,

and I love you.

Not because you fulfill all my fantasies

But because I no longer need my fantasies when I am with you.

I am your friend,

and I love you.

Not because you are my knight in shining armor

But because my caring, my acceptance, my appreciation and my essential valuing of you

transcends the role you play in my life or the form our relating takes.

I am your friend,

and I love you.

Not because you always say what I want to hear,

But because you are willing to communicate honestly and openly

and I am accepted when I do the same with you.

I am your friend,

and I love you.

Not because you see me as the ‘ideal’ woman,

But because I don’t have to be and instead can learn to be as genuine a human being as I can with you.

I am your friend,

and I love you.

Not because I like everything you do,

But because I can tell you honestly how I feel,

and know my feedback will be heard.

I am your friend,

and I love you.

Not because our relationship is perfect,

But because we both take responsibility for making it better and better.

I am your friend,

and I love you.

Not because you support all that I do,

But because you hold me to a standard of all I can be.

I am your friend,

and I love you.

Not because my issues never come up with you,

But because you provide a workshop where I can heal them.

I am your friend,

and I love you.

Because I truly care about your highest good

Because you laugh and play with me.

Because you never let me take anything too seriously

or forget that it’s all God.

Because I have a deep respect for you and genuinely like you.

Because I learn to know myself more fully with you.

And because ever since I can remember,

I knew there was someone out there who really knew what being a friend was

–and was willing to be one.
Me too.
n what ways does this poem speak to true or authentic love? What is the difference betwee
"romantic" love and the loving expressed here? How do these ideas match up with your experience?

from “I Am Your Friend” poems © Dr. Connie Stomper, 1990