Lasting Love

It takes patience to give love strength,
Deep understanding is won when we travel the lengths.
It can be persistent without selfish demands,
In trying times, it often commands.

Love is more than a tender touch,
Love can come in darkness and mean so much.
Love is made of many things blended together,
Through happiness and despair, it lasts forever.

Lasting love is made up of shared efforts and trials,
Held together by the memories that compile.
Lasting love is an experience of wealth,
A fortifying aura that brings good health.

Inspired by six lines from Helen Steiner Rice's poem From the Gift of Lasting Love:

Love is much more than a tender caress
And more than bright hours of happiness,
For a lasting love is made up of sharing
Both hours that are joyous and despairing.
It's made up of patience and deep understanding
And never of stubborn or selfish demanding.