A never-perfect love of Severus Snape

1. How did Severus Snape show his love after Lily’s death?
Harry Potter series of J.K.Rowling are among one of the best fantasy series, which
teach us subtle lessons about valuable things in life like friendship, mercy, braveness,
goodness, and of course, love. And of all the love stories in Harry Potter series, I am
highly touched by the one-sided love that Snape gives Lily, which is so lasting,
passionate, beautiful but yet so sad and desperate; a love that will never be perfect.
In the 7th book, when Harry finds out about the beautiful and brave soul that lies
under Snape’s cold mask, he also discovers how much love Snape has for Harry’s mother
– Lily. The passage below can best describe this love:

“But this is touching, Severus,” said Dumbledore seriously.

“Have you grown to care for the boy, after all?”
“For him?” shouted Snape. “Expecto Patronum!”
From the tip of his wand burst the silver doe. She landed on the office floor,
bounded once across the office, and soared out of the window. Dumbledore
watched her fly away, and as her silvery glow faded he turned back to Snape,
and his eyes were full of tears.
“After all this time?”
“Always,” said Snape.”

The incantation “Expecto Patronum” is something stands for happiness and

pureness because it is used and only usefully when the person making it thinks of his
happinest moment or the best memory in his life. As Snape’s patronum is a silver doe,
which means Lily, we know that after all these years, his best memory in his life is still be
Lily, and always be her. Through the first six books, readers do not understand why a
person seems so evil and malicious like Snape can be trusted by Dumbledore, and now, it
is answered, because of love. Love changes Snape, love gives him the strength to do the
dangerous but brave things in order to protect Lily’s only son. At last, Dumbledore asks
with his eyes full of tears “After all this time?”.

Albus Dumbledore is the greatest wizard of all time. And like what we often see in great
men, he always keeps a calm attitude to everything, rarely shows his emotions. It feels
like nothing overcomes his understanding, it seems he always holds everything in hand.
But there is one thing the greatest wizard of all time cannot understand deeply, that is
Snape's immortal love for Lily. Snape's love for Lily makes people like Dumbledore
mourn. Just to let you know that Snape's love can really touch anyone.

“This time” starts when Snape and Lily were still kids and friends at Hogwarts, it lasts
through their years at high school, when the love of Snape becomes stronger, through ups
and downs after Lily’s death, and lasts through Snape’s very life. “Always” is a short and
simple answer, but it means everything. It is a prove that his love will never change no
matter what happens.
Even when the death is near, Snape saves his last thought for the person he adores
the most, the person whom he sacrifices his life for. Because Harry has his mother’s eyes,
Snape asks Harry to look into his eyes, so that his last moment can be filled with the look
of those warm green eyes of Lily.

“Look...at...me..." he whispered. The green eyes found the black, but after a
second, something in the depths of the dark pair seemed to vanish, leaving them
fixed, blank, and empty. The hand holding Harry thudded to the floor, and
Snape moved no more.”

He leaves his life carrying the look of Lily Evans. In this passage, we can feel a
thorough sadness that embraces every words. Eventhough J.K.Rowling does not mention
any sadness signs, we can still feel the sorrow and pitifulness the author gives toward her
character. The way she describes Snape’s death by using the words “fixed” “blank” and
“empty” to describe his eyes, or “thudded to the floor” to describe his hand, gives us an
impression of poignancy. We feel sorry for the men because his love will never be
responded and he dies in a horrible way. But perhaps by letting interaction occur between
two people, J.K.Rowling does alleviate the pain and enables Snape to fulfil his last hope:
to look into Lily’s eyes before he dies.

2. Why Snape and Lily cannot become a couple?

Everyone knows, Lily and Snape are best friends since they were young, Snape is
the first wizard Lily knows, and Snape, since that moment, started liking Lily. And how
perfect when both of them are enrolled Hogwart at the same time.
However, the tragedy begins when Snape enters Slytherin and Lily goes to
Gryffindor. Lily and Snape still maintain a close relationship until the following years, if
not for the pranks of the group of James Potter. In the fifth year, when the jokes of James’
group came to a climax, Lily also tried to protect her best friend Severus, who at that time
did not know why, maybe because of the shame, the self-esteem of a Slytherin, the anger
of a boy, he called Lily Mudblood ─ this is also the moment that Snape himself ended his
relationship with Lily, since then, Snape had repeatedly apologized to Lily, but the
broken glass also did not heal, both ended here.
If you notice a little, if this unfortunate event didn’t happen, there are things,
probably also will gradually push Lily and Snape far and farther apart. If you think Snape
has always been the one to fight for the over-the-top jokes of James’ group, then you're
wrong, he always have the spells returned to them, as much as the time they prank on
him. From an early age, Snape was aware of himself and followed the dark art. Snape can
be said to be one of the best wizards in the world at the time, while he was in school,
using proficient curses, and even inventing 6 curses (including the Deep Cut Forever).
That is the first reason why Lily and Snape are farther and farther from each other.

And the most important reason to end this relationship is that Lily loves James. Do
not think James is a bad guy, everyone knows what James has done with Snape, but there
is always something behind that makes Lily loves James, like Lily can see the way James
treating his friends , well-played, and liberal. Instead of alienating the cursed werewolf
friend, he turned himself into an animagus when he was 15 years old (a witch or wizard
who can turn himself or herself into an animal). He let Sirius live in his house when
Sirius was not accepted by his family, gave Lupin a place to live when Lupin was
unemployed, without a place to live. He three times opposed Voldemort with the
phoenix. And if you do not notice, at the fateful night, when Voldemort came to kill
Harry, he jumped out to give Lily and his son for more time to run, with a little more
opportunity to escape from death.
“Lily, take Harry and go! It’s him! Go! Run! I’ll hold him off”

However, people are always sad for Snape's life, because the sad thing is that
Snape loves Lily too much, more than anything. At the end he accepted to live a life of
extreme suffering every day ─ that of course no one would want to ─ to protect Lily's
eyes on James's face. Finally, he succeeded.

3. Conclusion
One-sided love is the most painful, most tormenting, but also the happiest. Because it
is a love that does not intend to profit. Maybe many people feel sorry for Snape, but with
Snape, the happiest is to make the person he loves happy, that is enough. Maybe when he
goes to heaven, he can be satisfied and find his way back to Lily, the woman he adores
the most.