August 9, 1994 Work at Filmspace, the production company I am working for, has been amazingly slow, giving me extra free time to spend writing and conversing with my priceless stable of peers. On returning I have felt completely disinterested in my friends here. When spending time with them I am restless and irritable. Neither can I stay inside, so I wander the two streets that make this metropolis a town and put myself at the mercy of whatever experiences take me. I feel on-moored. Afloat on a lucid sea which tosses me ceaselessly on the troubled waters of the personalities which cross my path. The events of recent months have left me raw. I am unable to remain detached from the pageant of emotional landscapes that blemish my usual disregard for passers by. When returning here I found myself strangely compelled towards an acquaintance of mine named Ornelia. She is a tall white woman with understated red hair. Of Irish/Polish descent I believe. Ornelia distinguishes herself with a smart feminine fashion sense that leaves an impression of strong character. Chaotic streams of hair bathe her oval face, and her long flowing layers of dressing evoke sepiatone photographs, subtle aromas of dried rose petals, and horse-less carriages on dirty town squares. Besides a natural propensity that drew me to her, I felt she would be a safe friend because she is a close comrade of Sasha's. As our friendship quickly grew my first perception of her as a salient personality soon gave way to a living breathing human being who could not be experienced with indifference, then ignored when convenient. I first began to see beyond her hale composure last night as we drank at Zinos, a basement pub which Sasha and her cohorts call home. The small basement room was packed to capacity. The roar of the conversation swallowed her voice as she began to speak with a softly nostalgic manner. "There was this man I was seeing, his name was Randal, your writings to Sasha reminded me of the way he used to write to me. He went to England and a lot of stupid this and that...y'know.. began to get in the way. It was such a great relationship. When we broke up I said 'how can you let go of this?' We still talk a lot. He's in Alaska now. I know someday I'll settle for someone else, but he'll always be the...I was never one to use terms like soulmate or whatever, but he'll always be the one I feel I was meant to be with." Her openness seems so out of place in this raucous environment. There are tears in her hazel eyes and I am burning inside. Her story is one I've been told often of late. The true love left go. Sasha and I have been battered by external tumult for months, and although we vow to hang tough, as often as not one of us shows signs of letting go. My biggest fear is the feeling Ornelia spoke of. The feeling of settling for someone. My entire adult life has been such and the thought of faking fills me with nausea. When I think of this I wish to defy every onus fate can throw at me and die in cravenous martyrdom rather than turn aside this love. Thanks to the barroom clamor I have lost the thread of Ornelia's story. A Dos Equis bottle at the next table is knocked to the floor with a momentous crash and I am galvanized by one phrase; "About two years ago I was raped." I know this is a fact that even Sasha does not know and the strange circumstance in which she reveals this secret hits me like a sledgehammer. Even now I don't recall the details of her story. I do recall the hate I felt when Sasha told me how she escaped an attempted rape only to be raped by a man who pretended to be saving her. This knowledge reduced me, like his deceptively violent act, to the level of a Neanderthal. I felt hate for his taking what my jealous mind considers my sacred domain. Defiling that which I hold pure. I felt murder in my heart. And this time when I say the word 'murder' I am not using it as strong poetic imagery. I could truly commit this act with a clean conscious. At evening's end I walk Ornelia to her apartment where my car is parked in front. She invites me up to her room to get a blank cassette so that I can introduce her to the music of Billie Holidey. Once upstairs she plays Robert Johnson softly, lights candles, and brews herbal tea. We sit on the floor of her tiny room. I am at a loss for words and to create conversation I ask absentmindedly, "Do you read poetry?" "Some", she replies guardedly. Feeling the question to be awkward I retract, "I don't know why I ask that, I don't read poetry at all." "It was pretty rude of you to ask than, wasn't it", she states seriously. I am taken back by her rebuke. To my further surprise she pulls out three books and begins reciting, more from memory than the pages, various poems with a new, deliberate tone of voice. After the reading she insists that I borrow several books. The warmth of the ambiance of her room and the intensity of her emotional swings has made me soft inside. She stands up to move the window blinds. As she reaches in the air I notice for the first time that she is wearing a sort of mini dress which turns into a thin veil of gauze from below the hips down to her ankles. As she reaches up for the blind the lower half of her white bottom is clearly revealed beneath the black gauze. I assure myself that she is not aware of her exhibition. But I also recall Sasha's comment that Ornelia can be very competitive. Although I act as a gentleman I am overcome by a mixture of lust, and an urge to escape. For years the only sexuality which interested me was the exploration of decadence. Twenty dollar prostitutes, spontaneous blow jobs from chance encounters in moving cars, and frantic gropings in movie theaters with nymphomaniacs out to melt a stone heart. Normal sex had been reduced to the level of masturbation. A heartless, rough in and out as a convenient method to empty gonads. Sasha taught me to feel again. Perhaps for the first time I knew the pleasure of animal abandon equaled by spiritual union. Afterwards nothing less would do. At the same time my sexuality has been re-awakened with forceful vengeance. For days I have carried a perpetual erection. For the first time since adolescence my mind is filled with spontaneous fantasies. My desire is a dull, ever-present ache. Sasha, I am overflowing. It has been almost a month since I've battered your succulent wings. Images of your body flash through my mind and my semen drips without request. I can no longer imagine just making love to you. In my dreams I am attacking you, humiliating you, debasing you so you are reborn even more of a woman than your are now. And when I think of how I felt when we feared your pregnancy -I am awed by you as Woman. I respect you beyond compare. Not just your fecund ability to create life from the sperm which I waste so casually, but every action, every tiny gesture which reveals you as Woman. I hold your virtue sacred. In my mind you are purity. I feel no one is good enough to defile you, even myself. Although you are well experienced, your two years of celibacy makes you alive to me. Sometimes I reason; 'why should I penetrate her when I can share so much pleasure simply by lightly running my tongue across the thin hair on your caramel colored belly'. If I could I would place you on a pedestal, but I know doing so would eventually create an uncontrollable compulsion in me to tear you down and rape you in the dirt of the cruel earth. Sasha you are the essential. The form of forms. But you are also the personal and that is why I call your name. Because women exist everywhere but none are you, and the scourge of my life is that there is only one for me, and she is you. So now what Sasha? The truth is out. My hand is played. Perhaps you could put a leash on me and kick me if I make too much noise. Shout out 'sit!, heel!, roll over and play dead!'. Toss me a bone, pat me on the head, muzzle me or I may maul you tonight. I am at your mercy. What will you do now? 
The Apologia is a part of Caeser Pink's novel The Murder Of The Holly King. To get your copy and read the full story click here 
|