1,230 words for Antoinette‏
do, send picture as readily as you can. Obie. P.S. I thought about your
having been married twice and this seemed like having had too much
experience - like being so far removed from new. Then I thought and compared
this experience with instead never having been married but having had a
dozen different boy friends with sex included with all. I know a woman who
has ten children. These ten children have six fathers. When though are we
too far from new? And what of the possibility of aging - of living - of
experiencing and remaining new? Note these two sets of opposite poles: old
and young and old and new. One can be young and old. Another one can be old
and new. In ways I am old and new and in other ways I an old and old. What
of you? How do you feel? What state or condition are you in? Then there is
our perception of ourselves contrasted with or in complement with other
people's perceptions of us. And what of life and death or rather birth and
death? How far have we journeyed from birth - in time as well as across
space - and how near have we journeyed to our inevitable end? Looked at
another way: how much of Obie have I used up and how much is left? For you,
how much of Antoinette is used already - like an amount of tooth paste in a
tube and how much of her is left? And further: Who or what has used what of
us has been used and how? How pure - how uncontaminated is what remains of
us? What was used of us, was it squeezed out or was a mouth placed upon the
tube that's us - the tube we're in and was it sucked? Medicine I understand
should be poured into a spoon as to put the bottle to our heads contaminates
what's left. Could someone follow who has made use of us and find us fresh
still - pure still? I wonder deep within of these things always. This is
probably why I am not married yet. And what of me - how well - how
uncontaminated have I been kept? Writing is for me, I think, my attempt to
live - to know without being KNOWN in the Biblical sense. I write to renew
myself. Still I feel I wear myself out and I'm decomposing like a head of
lettuce or cabbage whether I like it or not. How I struggle though,
Antoinette to be new - to renew - to keep new. This is what I remember of
you - how absolutely brand new you'd seem always. I wanted that. I wanted
you. Almost out of my mind once over how flower-fresh you always seemed in
your grey blouse and blue skirt - with never a strand out of place; you and
all your class were writing an exam - you and everyone with your heads down.
I got so absolutely carried away [I think I had been imagining doing it for
a while.] I attempted to kiss your cheek; pretending to be examining your
paper - examining what you were writing. Just before I planted a kiss upon
your cheek you responded with disgust, kissed your teeth and awkwardly
pushed me away - rejecting my odd expression of love for you. Ever since I
have felt like a reprobate and unfit to teach - unworthy - felt ever since
that I should not have been/should not be permitted the care of - to be
custodian of such innocence. I felt I could not be trusted not to corrupt
what was - who was pretty - who was pure - like sullying well water or
dirtying a clean wall. This sickness though, it seems, is central to our
human condition. What does anyone want to do with what’s virgin or with a
virgin? Our inclination is not to preserve virginity in others. Instead, in
our culture, we are eager to take it away – our desire is to corrupt it.
Afterwards we brag about our having come upon what was fresh – what was pure
and plundering it – even as Columbus, Ponce de Leon, other European
conquistadors behaved towards and within the new world. For their actions –
their rape of place and people, they were given land, titles and honors.
Additionally I am reluctant to offer people things - food, drink, gifts -
fearing that my heart is insufficiently pure to give anything good. My
writing though is my gift to the world. What I write I give freely. Mixed in
my writing is the good and the bad in me - honesty - honest me. It is who I
am. It is truth. “Can you love this?” I seem to say. Can you love me? If you
can you can have me. Can you take the bitter with the sweet? Have you a
taste for this - for it - for me? Have you stomach for it? I think I am
human and good and bad - and honest about it. I think this is how we all are
- wonderful and flawed - wonderfully flawed - made of the dust of the earth
and of the breath of God. Are you of such a combination made, Antoinette?
Are you honest about it? I need to beg your forgiveness here and now if you
are that Antoinette. I was carried away in a way I hardly ever was in my
entire ten years of teaching. This has troubled me - worried me. Only
forgiveness can restore and redeem me. Am I a good person? Am I a bad
person? I know this: I am human and as a human being, I am capable of the
worst crime ever committed by anyone - by any man which was crucifying
Christ. I know also that, as a human being, I am capable of the greatest
good any man or woman has ever done which is to give my life as Christ did
for someone - this completely selfless act. I know I too can resurrect by
love’s redeeming power. I believe that I am capable of being loved – capable
of being totally forgiven. This though does stretch my faith. I do need the
powerful force of faith to accept and to receive such a depth of forgiveness
for the sins I’ve committed – like the one against you – committed because,
I have concluded, I am a no good person. This is what I am faced with having
to overcome, self-condemnation. I am caught therefore between man's worst
side and his best side wanting to die and wanting to live - wanting to love
and wanting to kill. I live longing for harmony - balance between these
antithetical forces. I love you as well as I am able in my broken state – in
my fallenness – in my forlornness. I long to be happy. My desire is that it
lasts. Instead it visits like a mirage – it glimmers and goes away with me
trying to summon it again always – trying to find the code – the right set
of tricks to cause love and happiness to reappear. You, Antoinette, have
reappeared. I want to see your picture. I must locate one of mine to send
you. See attachment. With all my love, Obediah.
Wed 5/16/07 11:04 PM