I chanced upon Leonard Cohen when I was 18. Like all memorable encounters, I remember the details: His raspy baritone that tends to insidiously grow on you, his strange words, a woman called Suzanne – clad in rags and feathers, and a lover who claimed he had no love to give her. And yet, he was willing to travel with her, even travel blind, for the river told him that he had always been her lover.

This curious state of being hopeless and hopeful, of waiting to be loved more than willing to love, and confessing the same without hesitance or shame spoke to my insecure teenage self like few things did. It also defined Cohen for me and his distinct, peculiar brand of love.

Eight years have passed since then. I have fallen in love many times since then. I have hurt and have been hurt, have left and have been left behind with equal, if not more, brutality many times since then. I have felt, in my most private moments, exhilarated and exacting, fettered and free, selfless and selfish. I have also discovered that these do not make me any less in love or any less a lover, but they reaffirm that I am in love and this is what lovers do.

If I speak of love and lovers with such generosity, it is because Cohen has convinced me so, through all these eight tumultuous years.