Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Christopher Okigbo’s poem "Love Apart" is a brief yet profound meditation on the distance and longing that can exist within a relationship. Through the use of natural imagery and a delicate, almost melancholic tone, Okigbo explores how love, though ever-present, can become elusive and insubstantial, leaving the lovers as mere shadows of their former selves, clinging to memories and illusions rather than to each other.

The poem begins with the image of the moon ascending between two pines, a metaphor for the separation between the two lovers. The moon, often associated with romance and longing, serves as a symbol of both connection and division. It rises "between us," indicating that something has come between the lovers, something that is both natural and inevitable, much like the phases of the moon. The pines "bow to each other," suggesting a mutual recognition of their bond, but the fact that they bow rather than embrace implies a formality or distance, a separation that has become part of their relationship.

As the poem continues, Okigbo emphasizes that "Love with the moon has ascended," indicating that love itself has taken on an ethereal quality, rising above the tangible and the earthly. The phrase "has fed on our solitary stems" further reinforces this idea, suggesting that love, instead of being a nourishing and grounding force, has grown by feeding on the isolation and solitude of the two individuals. The lovers, like the pines, are solitary beings who have not intertwined their roots but have remained separate, even as they reach towards each other.

The final lines of the poem present a poignant image of the lovers as "shadows / That cling to each other / But kiss the air only." This image captures the essence of the poem's central theme: the intangible, almost ghostly nature of their love. They are reduced to shadows, insubstantial and lacking in solidity, capable of clinging to each other only in a metaphorical sense. The act of "kissing the air" suggests an attempt to connect that ultimately fails, a gesture of love that lacks the substance and reality of physical connection.

"Love Apart" is a meditation on the inevitable distance that can grow between two people, even when love remains. The poem's use of natural imagery—the moon, the pines, and the shadows—reflects the way in which this distance is both a natural part of the human experience and a source of deep sadness. Okigbo's portrayal of love as something that has "ascended" and fed on solitude highlights the fragility and transience of human connections, leaving the reader with a sense of quiet resignation to the fact that sometimes, love, like the moon, is beautiful but distant, casting its light but remaining out of reach.

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