I had loved... no, I love!

Today is June twenty-sixth, two thousand nineteen. Exactly twelve-forty. At such a time, if an immature amateur writer attempts to tell a true story with premature wisdom, whether it will be considered merely a creation of whim—that is truly worth pondering.

In this small life of mine, with utterly modest experience, what I have understood is roughly this:
There is nothing real in saying "I had loved."
And saying "I love" also achieves nothing.
That is, love has no past tense.
And sometimes, there is no present tense either.
And in such past-present uncertainty, thoughts of the future are nothing but excess—what else could they be!

Why do I speak of these things?
A little while ago I received from someone such a gift as perhaps no one has ever given me before with such frank boldness, meant only for me.
After today, no one else will give such a thing.
Perhaps after this, even this person will not give again.
This is the very person to whom I can no longer say "I love" openly after all these years, cannot say "I am beside you."
The direct expression of love stopped long ago; perhaps we no longer even look at each other properly, face to face.
Instead, what is said is—I had loved!

This "I had loved" seems so much deeper than "I love"!
The present's intimate expression and exuberance is merely the despair of deep night, existing only in the past!
The pull of this love's past tense, its depth—how it understands me, how carefully it notices me, how tenderly it comprehends me...the present seems to have forgotten to seek me in the crowd of a thousand publicities!

That someone would understand me like this, would speak to me in exactly this manner—I never imagined.
It seems I should say...
Not "I had loved"...but "I love"!
Though never expressed, I could never erase it.
I never said "I am beside you," yet even today I could not move away.

I had loved...no, I love!