In chronological order, a sampling:
Subject: Without it
Because, you see, honesty is not enough. And good will isn’t enough. And feeling. And kisses. And intention. And meaning. And, sadly, love is not enough. We get confused sometimes because all those things are present when the unnamed catalyst exists. But without it—IT! —these beautiful moments are just that: furtive grasps at the divine, more bricks in the wall. All squares are rectangles. But not all rectangles are squares.
—
Subject: Easter Eggs
I spend the night eating chocolate Easter eggs. Crunching through the candy shell and letting the sweetness slowly dissolve on my tongue. It’s comforting. The sweetness. I use it as a proxy for my longing. The gentle ache you represent. Understanding always that the presumption of any future is a slippery slope. And dangerous to delicacy. The chocolate dissolves before the shell and as I lay on my back with my eyes closed I smile at the metaphor.
—
Subject: Absolute appreciation
Did I have to go there? I did. But there’s a good reason. You and I connect on such an intellectual level. I absolutely eat your brains. And I think you’re so fucking funny and interesting that I could listen to you speak for days. The mythical, perfect filibuster. That I don’t ever want to get too far off the road map to your being a woman. And a sensual being. And of the body. Corpus. Animus. Spiritus. So while this particular comment manifested in the profane, and perhaps ridiculous. It was rooted, and I do choose that word deliberately and carefully, in the fertile soil of absolute appreciation.
—
Subject: Eloped
I watched, while you were sleeping, and realized how completely contented and genuinely elated I remain — remain… do you know what it feels like to experience a continuous stream of elation… that’s also continuously on the rise?— thanks to your every loving action and unwaveringly adoring behavior? I really cannot describe the enormous amounts of joy and love and happiness and song and warmth, that I feel for you and that you give back to me many times over in reciprocity..
My love, you are my life and my everything. Thank you for your love. I would surely die without it.
Yours now and forever…
—
Subject:
My love — and you are just that — I am yours in every way that I define existence as a sentient being. I honestly believe that you and I are supposed to be together, to challenge and strengthen each other, to be each other’s catalyst for greatness, self actualization, and love. You are my life. I have absolutely no doubts about that absolute truth.
—
Subject: Emotionally detached analysis
Love, or more precisely the feeling that one is in possession of this emotion, is the decisive factor in determining the failure of an erotic relationship. And by this, I do not mean that failure is the result of some absence or inadequacy, but rather it is the mere presence of love that prescribes failure. So many of our resources are used in the pursuit of love, and the success or failure of this pursuit is so intertwined with how we define ourselves, that the day-to-day dynamic of most relationships present an emotionally unacceptable risk.
—
Subject: re: I see
I hate myself for writing this email but you have to know. My capacity for love is… there is no word but I love you more than that word
—
Subject: re: re: I See
Your capacity for love is tangible and sweet. That you would hate yourself for writing an email it saddens me.
—
Subject: Eulogy
Here, then, lay our reflections
Silent hymns to our complicity
The capricious change of heart and
The biases of memory
The rapture of despair and
The inevitable agony
Of off-white lies and furtive cries
And doe-eyed volatility
The promise of redemption
And shame at our complacency
Duplicitous omissions
That mock our claims of honesty
I burn for a reprise
Of our consumptive, common fallacy
The brief joy of our repose
From the familiar nihility
That nonpareil moment
Of our rage against eternity
—
Subject: Someone recently asked me if I liked poetry
Asking someone if they like poetry is an intimate question. It’s not the casual language of small talk. I assumed you were trying to communicate with me about something other than e.e. cummings. Remember when you believed in my nuanced understanding of the human condition? The choice of the word “someone” and the intimacy of the question indicates, whether or not it’s a lover, or even a man, it’s something like what we used to share.
The irony, of course, is that it was never about jealousy or control. It was about respect and true intimacy, that at the end, and sometimes in the middle, vanished. All the little omissions and inconsistencies were so confusing to me. You shut me out and let others in.
I look back and it plays in slow motion and though I lived through it, I still sometimes cannot believe it actually happened. That this is not just some phantasmagoria that hasn’t ended. You chose the worst-case scenario as your first option, setting events in motion that once invoked could not be recalled. At the most crucial moments, you made decisions that I would not have thought possible just a few weeks earlier, leaving everything unnecessarily in ruins.
—
Subject: Hands to the sky crying, “Why, oh why?”
Last April I sent that message to you, then apologized. I shouldn’t have. It perfectly captures the unspoken question repeating in your head since at least 2002. (It’s 2010, so I shouldn’t have to remind you that online journals never go away.) Why do those that have been given so much always have to question the gifts? Or use them to seek the lowest common denominator? And do their best to piss it all away?
—
Subject: I believe in you
I’m going to keep that diamond in my mind. I know you. Our time was double time. Inseparable. Alone together. Now I’m the devil’s child? It doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Look close. Closer. Closer still. Deeper. For thirty seconds, don’t think. Feel. Remember what it’s like to be new. Brand new. And still. For all this, love is never spent. The search for meaning is often encapsulated in the idea that the individual must recognize something larger than itself. Itself. Yourself. Myself. Self. Bigger than you. Bigger than me. Bigger. Biggest. Separate. My love for you, despite. Is. Was. Will be. Always.
—
Subject: The blanket
Believe it or not everything is venom and everything is love. In an artificial vacuum this is what passes for reflection: pining and trying to understand the purpose or meaning—if any—of an unprecedented sense of loss.
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A hypothetical conversation, in medias res, that could have happened just after dusk in late October (22nd) at, I don’t know, Shady Grove on Barton Springs?
[...]
“So, I have two theories about what happened.”
“Just two?”
“Two that I ruminate on.”
“You ruminate on everything.”
“Only when I’m running through scenarios.”
“That sounds exhausting.”
“It is. Anyway, the first one is Warren-Commission paranoid, yet strangely plausible.”
“Why is that?”
“Honestly? Linda? Really?”
“Tell me.”
“Everything you’ve ever said to me is in play. Are you really going camping this weekend with your brother and his girlfriend? Are you really going to see your brother after we finish here? Because, I don’t believe you. You didn’t visit your brother once in the six months we lived together and now you’re going to go see him at 9:30 when you have to work tomorrow? Sounds more like a sleepover.”
“I’m not lying to you.”
“Well, there’s the rub, isn’t it?”
“What?”
“That’s what a liar would say. A sociopath would say it as calmly as you just did.”
“So now I’m a sociopath?”
“Technically, if you were, you probably wouldn’t be able to tell me.”
“Always a wise ass. Fine.”
“The second theory I would bet my life that I was correct. And I wouldn’t lose.”
“You’re always so fucking dramatic.”
“I told you that, literally, in the first sentence of the first email I ever wrote to you that wasn’t about contracts.”
“Intense. Needy. Sometimes, intensely needy.”
“You bothered to remember?”
“What do you want me to say?”
“My default answer is ‘The truth.’ But, I wouldn’t believe anything you said at this point anyway. By the way, I brought your book back, the one about Schrödinger’s cat; the one that made me fall in love with you.”
“Keep it.”
“I don’t want it. It hurts to look at.”
“So why are we here, then?”
“You can go if you want.”
“Why are we here?”
“I wanted to look in your eyes when I asked and you answered.”
“What good is that if I’m a sociopath?”
“You’re not. You’re just a liar. And to be honest, you’re not a very good one. Your voice doesn’t break but you always look away. Down, then to the right. Always. I used to play poker, remember?”
“You can be such a fucking asshole.”
“Yes. I really can. So, conspiracy theory number one.”
“This should be good.”
“I’ve seen you fall-down drunk just once, in all the time I’ve known you. In fact, it’s the only time I’ve seen you drunk. On alcohol, anyway.”
“July 4th.”
“Right. All your friends from Beaumont were there. So here’s theory number one. Someone you were pining for, but never thought would pan out, showed up that night. And wanted to hook up. But when he found out you were married, cut you off. So you got drunk. I couldn’t find you for an hour in your sister’s little house. But she knew exactly where you were. And probably why.”
“You really believe that?”
“Everything is in play.”
“Fuck you.”
“If you don’t tell anyone.”
“No, really, fuck you.”
“Wait till you hear number two.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Because you know it’s true. I haven’t even said it yet, and you know it’s true. You remember when you were cheating on John with me?”
“I never cheated.”
“Well, there was no genital exchange, Mrs. Clinton, no blue dress. Technically, you waited until the day after you broke up, but we were cheating and you know it.”
“Whatever.”
“Yeah, whatever. Did I at least get that day?”
“Make your fucking point already.”
“In retrospect, I realized that we never met at night. It was always during the day, or on the weekends. Or, when you ‘Had to work late,’ during the week. I remember you calling him and telling him while you were sitting with me, speaking as calmly as you are now. Toward the end, with us, remember how many nights you had to work late?”
“I did work late, asshole.”
“I know, it’s probably just a coincidence.”
“Fuck you, I’m leaving.”
“You just looked down, and to the right.”
“Fuck you.”
“No, fuck you. You really expected me to believe that after being unemployed for four months, you would take a 3-hour lunch to see a movie in your first week at work? Oh, and with ‘two’ guys I didn’t know? We all know it was one guy, and since it’s been six months he’s probably already gone as well, but I bet he’s still sniffing around. It’s your fucking M.O. Daytime dates and nighttime betrayals.”
“Stop. Please. Stop.”
“Why did you marry me? Was it for the story? Was it a joke? You always bragged about being a groupie for that comedian. That’s why I thought you found another one. Remember? Things weren’t perfect for two seconds and you bailed. Someone talked you into leaving weeks before you left.”
“I’m leaving now.”
“Is there a road back?”
“I don’t know.”
“I think I’m glad to see you go.”