Is love imaginary…and in its essence narcissistic?

 Is love imaginary…? 

to be loved is to feel safe

So is love just a purely imaginary phenomena? 

 Lacan tells a story about his friend Picasso whose pet parrot would nibble at the lapels of the artist’s jacket. This is love, Lacan says. The parrot loves Picasso, and his clothes, but not as some kind of proxy for Picasso but as Picasso.

 “This parrot was in effect in love with what is essential to man, namely, his attire” (Seminar XX, 21st November, 1972). Picasso was inseparable from his image no less than his art was inseparable from its image. For the parrot, the clothes therefore make the man, and love by extension is simply an imaginary phenomenon, “love in its essence is narcissistic” (ibid).