Exploring the Edges

There is only one word for love, but there should be at least seventeen. In all its flavors and varieties, it comes wonderfully and unexpectedly. With each coupling, it gains strength.


I made a mixed tape of my musings, an aberration of sound. I sincerely hope you have lost or destroyed it by now. I sang, read passages from Song of Solomon and recorded the radio out of tune. I did it to show I loved you, but I was in love with love then. I did not have a definition or a medium to express it in.

I gladly sat on your lap and laughed at the fact that I could attract the attention of your friends with a bend at the hips, a twist in my mixed drink, an audible expression of the things I think.

I once believed love was God’s true identity, that He lived and breathed through our passions. I am not certain how it happened, but I have since abandoned that theory.

We roasted around a fire of phallic twigs, faggots, sausages and plastic casings, threatening raccoons marooned in thick bushes. Each conversation led back to the same conclusions.

I am still exploring the edges of this place. I have yet to traverse the whole country, to plunge into the deepest valleys and climb to the highest peaks. I have taken many companions along with me, but none of them can guide the way.

I shudder to even speak that word to anyone, even friends I have carried with me for years. Sometimes that word, with all its awful power, only brings me to tears.

Horny humans with ash on our faces, we danced in circles of shadow and light. We gazed at the stars and counted our freckles ‘til midnight.

Some nights, I wish I could just stay in one place, but come morning I move on toward the rushing day.

I whisper it under my breath, uncertain, in fear.