*walks bravely into... the parlour* (after checking her for extra legs & him for fly wings - hey! you never know!)

mmm... nice decor. love what you've done with the place!

*they sip tea, & nonchalantly eye each other... he begins to tell her a story*

"once upon a time (& he says this, for all the best stories start this way) i was as shy as a noonday shadow. hardly there, unnoticed unless you realize that you're standing on me. (ffw to spiky-haired boy having his nipples tweaked in a parking lot. hey! what happened in between? what happened to the shadow-boy? why all the latex, leather & fishnet? and what's with the make up? all these questions...

think i evolved. not like a fish crawling out of water, but maybe more like the unnoticed life form sitting in the shade of a tree nearby that watches this happen and realizes: ooh! looks what those things are doing! looks like fun. let's see how far we can take this.... so, ja, far from unique (i'll borrow all your best ideas, spend half an hour alone with them & a pair of scissors, a glue pot and maybe some fun-fur, and wear 'em like they were made to be mine, i'm just like everyone else. but sometimes more so.

"facts," she murmurs, "tell me of the real."

i learnt that words are living things.

i learnt about fantasy from the girls who ignored me.

i learnt about love from falling into it with a lesbian.

i know that meaning is fabricated. i know how to do it. and i know that when you give something meaning it becomes real. real as stones.

*sips tea, watches her eyes*

i know mythology happens.

i have been directly responsible for the death of two people.

i have had paranormal experiences (well, these days, who hasn't?)

i once sold everything i had & ran away to the amazon jungle and lived with shamans.

i have flipped my existence over, looked at the underbelly and, recognising the animal, have been totally disgusted with myself. and horrified that the beast lives so close (closer than blood - don't you just love that expression?) to the surface. kind of just in the shadow of me. and no, it's not always asleep.

i was once in love with myself (dunno if i ever got over it...)

i know that real life doesn't happen the way it does in comic books.

i know that i have just begun to be me...

and now? what's the life form on the beach with eyes all agog doing now?

i am learning grace. it's rather more difficult than i thought it would be.

i am learning what it is to be responsible for my own existence.

and i dabble in aesthetics.

... and i'm still hopeful that the next fish to crawl from the ocean will show me something new... something me...

- well, that's the beginning of me. still curious? there's more. & i've kept some of the best parts for later. just like in the movies. got popcorn? i sense there's a twist in the tale. maybe it'll surprise us in the library. or the conservatory (how big is this house anyway? seems like the rooms stretch out in all directions, forever...)

and what of you?

* linking his arm in hers, they leave the room, their footsteps echoing on the foundation stones as she leads him to...

a feeling. i'll capture it. there. i'll give it a word. to contain it. now it is the word.

another. & another. all apprehended.

i'll bind the words with sentiment. now i've created a sentence. all to express something that should never be said with words. something sentenced by the binding construct of words.

now i'll tie the sentences together: a lover's knot. a loveletter.

with so many words. all of them so different. all of them trying to express that which cannot be said. with words. all of them speaking in tongues that are not their own. saying i love you in so many ways. with feeling. feeling that cannot be apprehended.

because it is.

now i plant tulips in the fields...

it wasn't always like this. a sexual meniscus existed, encapsulating our creations. what we were.

our love.

a seething sea of lubricity, peopled by our fancies, our experiments, our delicious mistakes. pulsating at the membrane-thin borders of our imagination.

thrusting beyond.

yet always barely contained in our own private world. until...

the pointed edges of carnal lust. i wouldn't. you would. we were impaled upon the horns of our dilemma. i was selfish. you shared.

you shared.

a little dutch boy stood in the field beside a dyke & watched a trickle of water seeping through a crack in the wall. all of his world stood behind him, defenseless against the flood. he raised his finger to the hole...

i did the only thing i knew. i put my self in the rupture. i stood between our passions & your passion. i became the point of no return.

i became whole.

& i tried to hold it all together. to hold it.

i spilled.

just as i lost myself in it. i tried to know it. shouldn't have. got too close. closer than blood. in too deep. fell in. felon.

crimes of passion. they stain me. sustain me. i became a whore. stains everywhere. anywhere. there. no, a little to the left...

write. write it all down. salvage some of the intimacy. let the ink of my life flow onto the sheets. then climb in between them. put my finger in. pierce the membrane.

the meniscus. us.

once i held back the waters you let flow. my world stretched out behind me. you could always see through me. a bag of seeds at your waist, you steered the plough.

now i plant tulips in the fields...

she walked out of the garden

& into my dream where

a solitary tree stood

casting

the angles of its awkward branches

to the sky

within its filigree

she saw herself as a bird

a flapping black raven

which

without a sound flew

towards her only

to fall bleeding at her feet

she

knelt & looking down saw

she

was covered with menstrual blood

within

which she saw

forming

the image of a flower

a rose

caressing it with her fingers

she found feelings

like the motion of a garden

as flowers grow

within her

to the earth

she knelt

covering the roots of her

rose

with the feelings

of her hands

alive

like one returned

to a familiar garden

then

she watched it grow

last night she ate the fruit

walk a little further with me, girl. into the leaved depths of the trees. there! where the vines grow thickest, is something i will share with you. something like a fruit.

flowers, they are at their most beautiful in this place. blooming full & bright with the colours of dreams, their nectar hangs heavy in the glistening air. i will cover your nymphean nakedness with petals, weave you a garland of grapes. there! we are almost there. but there is a secret.

can you feel it? can you keep a secret?

"just how far do you think we should take this thing?" he asked, standing at the very edge of nothingness & staring vaguely out into the unknown.

"as far as it will go, i suppose," the girl answered.

"do you think it... needs something?"

"perhaps..."

"should we?"

"let's..."

"the whip?"

"of course! but gently. we still have far to go."

"but there's nothing out there!"

she: "we'll make it up as we go along..."

& with that, they each mounted their end of the conversation, & using the whip with great care, rode on a little further...