marion & margaret - song note - 1980
the
onslaught of sexuality in my life wiped out, to a large extent, the
feelings that came before it. my relationship to sex, sex with
myself, with my brother, with my teenage male friends, was both violent
and present. women came again later, when they became accessible
physically. between the ages of 11 and 17 what mattered was
availability. my hand, my brother's ass, looking through a window
at someone, humping a corner lamp post; if it worked, i did it,
with few reservations.
ironically, when i focus back now, prior to genital preoccupation, my
feeling were strictly hetero, woman-directed, gentle, diffuse, tender,
protective; they came from my heart; a feeling of total love
enveloped me.
i loved women then, without question. beauty, as i saw it, played
an important part. as well as the sweet receptivity of the
object. [ a willingness to flirt was enough.] i cherished every
detail of the women i admired: their clothes, their perfume, their
gestures. i would see them in church on Sundays; young
women, between the ages of sixteen and twenty two or three. i was
nine. contact was mainly visual. their legs in 'nylon'
stockings, their buttocks in tight, black skirts, the details of lipstick and eye-shadow, and the shapes of breasts-in-brasierres under
white, translucent, nylon blouses, i studied. i memorized
expressions, twists of the body, the weight on on leg or the
other, how they walked.
looking back to there from now, when i hardly remember anything
current, especially the names of people and places, it amazes me that i
remembered [though i can't now] for years, the name of a small town in
up-state New York that was the home town of a camp councilor i met and
flirted with for a week in the summer of my 11th year, her name
is even farther lost in the recesses of my memory. for ten years,
with diminishing intensity, i admit, i harbored the fantasy of someday
visiting her in this little town, so that even now the name hovers near
the surface ... Jericho? Genessee? a 'J' or a 'G' .... [ it's Goshen, NY. everything comes back eventually. ]
this was, of course, a 'secular' affair and very brief; a few
remarks, smiles some cuteness, no doubt, then separation. the
true loves of my adolescent life were the women i saw in church, Sunday
after Sunday: Marian Klomm, Renate Miller, Ruth and Elizabeth
Haganah, Edna Lutz, [my first 'married' woman] and Howie Weimar's
sister, whose name escapes me, though she drove me to excess [i would
sometimes throw myself upon her bodily, the nine year old equivalent of
rape, i suppose.]
Ruth is included here for the sake of completeness, but, in fact, she
was just a little older than i, and later became my first, true
childhood sweetheart, a story in itself. the others were much
older, in that real way that six years is almost half a lifetime when
you're nine. i loved them all as passionately as they were
inaccessible, and so it must have been nearly uncontrollable
anticipation that gripped me when i learned that i was to spend the
weekend at Marian Klomm's parent's home.
Marian K's backyard abutted the perimeter of a soccer field. and
on the Saturday afternoon that my parents dropped me off there we all
went out to watch the game. no doubt, there were sandwiches, cold
cuts, potato salad and beer; the weather was sunny and mild.
my parents had done what they never did: they went away together,
alone, for two days. and i was doing what i never did: relaxing
and enjoying myself with these ordinary, friendly, generous Germans -
without the watchful eye of the Lord upon me.
the afternoon passed in a warm haze. the soccer players ran back
and forth below us, butting and kicking, for the amusement of the folks
in the row-house back yards if Brooklyn.
and where was the raven-haired, sultry Marian? i'm not sure.
on my mind, certainly, but i don't remember her consciously until
evening. after supper the family gathered in the living room to
watch TV, take it easy. and then Marian is there, sitting it the
middle of the living room floor, her jet-black hair about her
shoulders. she's brushing it. the TV screen is just a blur
as i watch that arm and that hand and that brush and that hair.
how i made the transition from the couch to floor, from observer to
participant, i don't know. wanting made it so. hours passed
as i sat close behind her and brushed and brushed. a childhood
of love and longing was spent on that hair; time stopped, bed
time didn't come, 'Gunsmoke' came and went, barely noticed; and
Sunday morning church seemed forever ahead until that romance was over.
the tenderness lingers to this day. we're both long gone along
the river of time, to husbands and wives, and children and places far
away. but sometimes, when i'm around the old neighborhood, i
ask, 'how's Marian? ' and i guess as long as someone still
knows, i'll ask and i'll care.