Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Chapter 3 - Georges Du Roy Meets Lily Bart: Du Roy and Lily Bart: Bel Ami and House of Mirth

Lily - Georgia O'Keeffe


The informal gathering at Mrs. Trenor’s that evening was a familiar social gathering for Lily. She arrived with Amelia and Lady Skiddaw and they entered together.

“Why Lily,” said Mrs. Trenor. “Where have you been keeping yourself since you returned from Monaco? We have missed you, and she kissed each of her cheeks in welcome.”

“My Aunt, Mrs. Peniston, has not been well, and I have been attending to her, that’s all. But here I am and so happy to see you.”

Soon people were conversing, mixing with each other, partaking of tidbits of food and listening to the music and Lily began to feel that maybe Amelia was right, that being here was all that was needed to dispel the ugly stories spread by Bertha Dorset.

Wearing a bias cut pale rose silk gown, with a deep scalloped neckline, Lily looked more wonderful than anyone else in the room, as usual. Her head high on her slender neck, her eyes bright with contentment at being there, she was ready to forgive all for their  shunning of her.

I walk in the door and look around for the Duchess hoping to see Lily Bart with her. And then I see Lily, as she is the only one in the room. My god, she is beautiful, tall, slender, her hair piled high, lovely white face, arms, shoulders. Yes, Amelia was exactly right. I would not hesitate to ask her right this minute, book passage and take her away. Perfect.

The Duchess sees me and glances at Lily. I nod to let her know I have already seen and to indicate that she was correct. I am grateful to her for enticing me here. She comes to my side, introduces me to her hostess, then says, “There is someone I want you to meet.” We both know who that is.

She arrives at Lily’s side after greeting a number of people on the way, and she touches Lily’s arm and says, “Lily, I have been wanting you to meet a friend of mine from Paris, the Baron Du Roy of Cantel”

I bow to Lily, take her hand, and kiss her skin with open lips. The barest touch of the tip of my tongue licks her. I immediately look into her eyes and I see that her pupils have dilated. Excellent, I think, excellent.

Her face gives nothing away, her eyes cool, polite, friendly, warm, her mouth and face the same, and I say to her,

“Mademoiselle Bart, you are beautiful and incomparable, graceful and perfect. There has been no exaggeration of your loveliness.”

She replies, “Your exceeding charm has been greatly underestimated.”

She has mirrored me. And precisely. I am surprised.  Her voice is beautifully modulated.  She is perceptive, intelligent, well the adjectives would flow but are not necessary.

Already I am enchanted with her. 

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Chapter 2: The Duchess Conspires-Lily Bart and Georges Du Roy - Bel Ami and House of Mirth

Louise Bourgeois - Red Flowers

“Lily, I am so glad you could come. Lady Skiddaw and I would like to spend as much time with you as possible while we are here. Are you going to be free enough for that?”

“Since I got back from Monte Carlo I have all the free time in the world, Duchess. Or haven’t you heard the news?”

“Amelia, please. My title is only for those fogies to whom it is so important. Not for my friends. Yes, I did hear, but it will blow over and things will get back to normal for you. Actually I hope they don’t but that is for our next topic of conversation.”

“I think not. Bertha Dorset seems intent on ruining me. She imagines things until she believes they are true.”

“Well, no one believes her, certainly?”

“No, but she has all the money and power over the social network here, and I have none. They can’t afford to displease her.”

“When I am here, if they want me, they will have to have you. By the time my visit is over, you will be integrated back in their set, and she will have to plan something else.  I see you are laughing Lily.Does that mean you agree with me?”

“Not at all, but we will see, won’t we? Where shall we go tonight? I had some ideas, but what are yours?”

Mrs. Trenor invited Lady Skiddaw and myself to a small intimate party she is having. I told her we were already engaged with you and that I would check with you to see if you could reschedule. She immediately asked me to bring you, by all means. See how it works! Voila! I also mentioned Baron Du Roy is here and wishes to meet some English women. But he is here to meet you and marry you, Lily.”

“Oh, Amelia,” Lily laughs. “I’ve never met him. How could he want that. He knows nothing about me. What happened to all the beauties in Paris? Did they all disappear?” And Lily laughs softly again.

“My dear, he does not need to know anything about you. He knows me, and that is all that is needed. I told him about you and he decided to come to New York with me to meet you.  Don’t look so astonished. He is looking for a wife. His young wife died in childbirth almost three years ago, and he has a young child, a boy, who has never had a mother. He, for some reason I don’t know, prefers to find an English speaking woman for himself and his son.”

“Really, Amelia, you can’t mean this.”

“But I do. He is here now, staying at my hotel. He is titled, very, very rich, very handsome, is the editor of the largest most influential newspaper in all of Paris, La Vie Francaise, an accomplished political journalist, author of some short stories, is working on a novel, and his son is heir to the Walter fortune – Walter owns the newspaper and he was married to his daughter “

“He certainly sounds very busy. Where can he find the time to find a wife and marry?’ laughs Lily.

“You may laugh, Lily, but there are many people who take me far more seriously than you do.” Amelia puts on a pouting face and Lily laughs again.

“I will certainly meet your Baron and help him find a more suitable choice than I.”

“Oh, Lily, you foolish girl. He is perfect for you. Why wouldn’t you want to marry him?”

“Well, that’s hard to say since I’ve never laid eyes on him.”

“You will tonight. I have told him he must come to meet you there. So that’s that. I want you to dress lovely, but then you always do anyway, so just prepare yourself to greet him without any prior judgments, will you please?”

“I will,” says Lily, “I will.”


Saturday, September 24, 2011

Chapter 1: Du Roy Wants a Wife:Georges Du Roy and Lily Bart - Bel Ami and House of MIrth



Robert Pattinson As Georges DuRoy

Suzanne has been gone almost three years now. My son is growing up and Madame Walter is not the best influence for him. I live in the Walter mansion and she still has not said a word to me unless it is about my son. I have employed nursemaids but they do not satisfy my aspirations for my son, so I have continued looking, until I finally understood that no one is going to be perfect for him. This presents me with a problem, because I do not wish to marry again. I am content with Clo and others with no one making demands on me.

Suzanne was so lovely and fun. We had barely gotten to really know each other when she became pregnant. Her mother insisted on her being much more confined than I wished and I was furious, as I knew the real reason. She had her convinced that sex would be harmful and Suzanne was fearful with me after that. We were just learning each other. I still saw Clo, of course, but I did not have the same desire for her as I had had before my marriage to Suzanne. It was a trying time for Suzanne and me, but I thought that after the child was born, things would improve.

Only she died in childbirth. I was left with an infant and, not exactly a broken heart, but a sense of real loss for what might have been. After two years I began to think about what I might do to find a mother for my son and a wife for myself. Young women were no longer acceptable to me as I could not see them as mothers. In bed I knew they would be ardent, for a while anyway, and that was agreeable to me. What I really wanted was someone who could preside over my life as I lived it with calm and tact, who would be good for my son and compatible with me. But she had to be beautiful. And she had to have integrity. I did not wish another highly polished cocotte like Madeleine. I no longer needed to marry wealth as I now had the millions from Suzanne’s death and my son was the legal heir to the Walter fortune. Strange how things twist and turn according to fate.

With my melancholy I read more to console myself and I began to see different possibilities beyond my journalistic career. My confidence in my writing had grown as my understanding grew. I began to write short stories, to publish them and I was trying to work on a novel with not much luck. I needed the atmosphere my own wife could provide.  I was never the kind of man who can be content living alone indefinitely.

I decided I didn’t want a French woman. My tastes had changed.  I wanted an English woman or an American one. I had a working knowledge of English, but after reading Madame Bovary I read some of the English women writers and then I read Wuthering Heights and I saw myself in Heathcliff. This had never happened to me before. I had not been a student at all when young. I had to make my way in the world as best I could. I knew Heathcliff so deeply and also the part of him that was wounded. But I had never loved like Heathcliff, and I was not looking for that, but as a character he intrigued me and I gained in self-knowledge knowing that we were so close. I had escaped his fate as Suzanne was more courageous than Cathy, but then she was so young and the young are often like that.

I think I wanted an English speaking woman because I was so infatuated with Emily Bronte. I decided that if I married an English speaking woman that the language would be a barrier between us. So I worked on fluency with Emily Bronte. She is a genius with language and her imagination is unrivaled. Was it wise of me to absorb her so completely? I didn’t know, but no other writer had captured me like this girl I would have loved to know.

But an American woman was more of a decided challenge to me. We French have such a love affair with the New World. And then at an event I met the Duchess of Beltshire and her companion Lady Skiddaw. As she was my dinner partner, she began to tell me of a most remarkable woman she had been recently reacquainted with at Monte Carlo.

“You know Georges, I may call you that may I not, well, I will anyway whether or no, it is time you remarried. I have heard your young wife died almost three years ago now and your young son must need a mother’s care and supervision. I have recently come back from the Riviera and I again met a most remarkable young woman there. I tried to get her to accompany myself and Lady Skiddaw back to the continent, but she felt it was imperative that she return to America. Why, I don’t know. She is astonishingly beautiful and has such amazing social graces she makes it such a pleasure to be with her. She is fun, gracious, considerate, has exquisite taste, really just perfect.

"But she is unmarried, and no one really understands exactly why. Ten years ago at Aix an Italian Prince, Prince Virigliano, rich and the real thing, was determined to marry her. As the marriage papers were being drawn up his good-looking stepson arrived and Lily, that’s her name, Lily Bart, apparently flirted with him and the two men argued openly. A scandal irrupted. Everyone began looking at her so queerly. Her horrible aunt, Mrs. Peniston, with whom she lives, felt a little ill, and thinking it was the food or climate or some such stupid thing, decided she would return home with her ward. Lily’s parents are dead and she has no money of her own, but is desired by the best people in New York City because of her beauty, her grace and her infallible tact.

"The Crown Princess of Macedonia was so taken with her when she stopped for a week at Monte Carlo she invited her to stay with her at Cimiez, wishing to bring Lily into her traveling entourage. Bertha Dorset had invited her to cruise the Mediterranean with a party of friends on her yacht the Sabrina, to occupy her husband while she dallied with a young poetShe was so jealous of Lily’s success everywhere she set sail for Monaco and the Casino at Monte Carlo, bringing Lily with her. It was there that I met her again. Bertha Dorset just did not understand that it is Lily's beauty that does it, that attracts everyone to her.  And she cannot transfer it to the people who invite her to social gatherings and voyages, so they blame her. Her face is so beautiful that it opens endless doors for her, but it also creates terrible destruction for her. Men want her and women are livid with jealousy. It's both a gift from the gods and a terrible curse.


"A Mrs. Fisher who knows her has discussed her with me. I have heard other stories too of course. A very suitable match becomes infatuated with her, and she seems ready to accept him, but then she oversleeps, goes on a picnic, etc. and the whole thing is ruined. My acquaintance Mrs. Fisher says she thinks it is because Lily despises the things she is trying for. She is twenty-nine now and more beautiful than she ever was. All of her friends’ husbands are infatuated with her, but she is lovely and polite and chaste, wanting nothing to do with them in the way they wish. She has a friend in Lawrence Selden, but he is an attorney with no assets, wealth, inherited or otherwise. He is not a possibility for Lily. She is poor, but as she often chides, she is a very expensive woman.

"I think you must meet her. She is perfect for you, and you, of course, are perfect for her. You are a Baron, exceptionally wealthy, an accomplished journalist, a writer, widowed and definitely looking for a wife and a mother for your very young son. You are not under the influence of anyone else, family or otherwise," and here the Duchess winks, "and I daresay you are experienced. You will know how to get her to say yes very quickly. I am going to New York City very soon, and I can arrange for you to meet her. The rest will be up to you naturally, but you will know how to proceed.

The Duchess winks again at me. She is known to be a liberal uninhibited person as she travels around the world of the privileged. They seek her company and pout when she tosses them off as bores. Obviously this Lily Bart does not bore her at all. In fact she is still quite taken with her. And I am intrigued to meet this American Cinderella, who does not sit by the fire in rags, but is always exquisitely dressed, sought by royalty and wealth, and looking for a husband. A husband who can offer her what I can offer. What could be more perfect.

"My gracious thanks to you. I think I shall take your advice. When are you sailing? We shall go together?" I take her hand and kiss it lingeringly.

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Introduction: Georges Duroy and Lily Bart - Bel Ami and House of MIrth

Agnes Martin
Georges Duroy (Bel Ami) has been widowed. His lovely young wife Suzanne has died in childbirth. His very young son is now the heir to the great Walter fortune. Duroy has come to New York City because he has heard of the beautiful and incomparable Lily Bart (House of Mirth). He wishes to marry her, return with her to Paris, have her preside over his extravagant lifestyle and sensitively guide the raising and education of his son. He expects no hindrance in his plans. He is offering a fortune and a way out for her.

Georges Duroy in Bel Ami and Lily Bart in House of Mirth are both caught in the Foucauldian grid, web, at the end of the 19th century. They are caught in Foucault's power/knowledge/capital nexus, but one rarely knows they are in it until ...well until they study Foucault. People know they are trapped, but usually in a local way where the system keeps throwing obstacles at them, and they blame themselves for a long while until they fully know, if ever, that that's the way it is set up. Their existential, situationalist choice then is to give in or resist, and how best to resist when inside the Foucauldian paradigm. Baudrillard since 9-11 has suggested otherwise. Just leap out of it. Risk it all. DeLillo's solution is in narrative transcendence, but Baudrillard reading through Foucault does not believe in transcendence so it is not an option with either one of them.

Duroy is not a bastard, not a horrible person. He is just making choices inside his wiggle room and it is pretty confining. To dump judgement on him as a character doesn't make much sense. The PC feminist introduction in my edition of House of Mirth by an esteemed Harvard professor, blames Lily for being shallow and seeing herself only through the eyes of everyone around her. Of being an object of conspicuous consumption for some man she traps. This is simplistic psychological swampy interpretation. She is securely caught in the web. She has some wiggle room, just enough to know that she is caught in a place and time that is boring but comfortable, until it isn't anymore.

Georges can only improve his situation in life by marrying up. The same is true of Lily, only her situation is worse. A young woman cannot do anything if she isn't married. And she must not, must remain spotless, until she snags someone who can afford to keep her in the style to which she has become accustomed. Lily and Georges could never have had each other as they are in the books, when unmarried, if they had met and been attracted to each other. Both are caught in the awful hypocrisy of the social structure they are wedged in, and neither sees anyway out but up or sink and drown.

So to condemn them with ideas from our own times is just precession and only a silly game of speculation. If you see them in the time they are in and the grid of power/knowledge/capital of that time, you may have a chance to see your own place now in that same grid, as it plays out today.

This is the grid DeLillo has Eric Packer in on that last day of his life in Cosmopolis. It is start stop. Moving in quarter inches as Torval says. As House of Mirth unfolds Lily Bart begins to feel the tightening threads as Georges Duroy feels them in the beginning of Bel Ami. Duroy is on his way up and Lily is on her way down, which she can always so far, stop, but always only at great personal loss of her sensibilities and integrity. And in House of Mirth, she sees the dead end sign at the end of the road.

This fanfic is an imagined meeting of the widowed Duroy, after his marriage to Suzanne, and Lily who live in the same time warp, are close in age, move in a similar social class, and what might have been possible for them.

Sunday, September 18, 2011

Irresistible Destiny:Chapter 18 - Mine



Books » 310 series » Twilight: Impossible Destiny
Author: seymourblogger
Rated: M - English - Fantasy/Romance - Published: 08-31-11 - Updated: 09-09-11id:7342016
Twilight: Irresistible Destiny


The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock - T.S. Eliot

Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread against the sky...
...In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo...
...I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each,
I do not think that they will sing to me.










Now Suzanne takes your hand
And she leads you to the river
She is wearing rags and feathers
From Salvation Army counters
And the sun pours down like honey
On our lady of the harbour
And she shows you where to look
Among the garbage and the flowers
There are heroes in the seaweed
There are children in the morning
They are leaning out for love
And they will lean that way forever
While Suzanne holds the mirror
And you want to travel with her
And you want to travel blind
And you know that you can trust her
For she's touched your perfect body with her mind.

Chapter 18
BPOV


As I sit on his lap I feel him getting hard, desiring me and I kiss him a little harder, then harder until I begin to feel his breath changing. There is no one in this room so I slip my legs over him and straddle him, and then he really gets hard, so I can feel him through my little silk skirt. I have no panties on just in case. My mouth is on his neck and I nibble and then graze my teeth on his now pulsing artery. I catch my breath, he smells so delicious and tastes so good.




My hands find him below and I place him in front of my entrance over my skirt so I can feel him more as I lean in to kiss him. Edward catches his breath and begins to breathe raggedly.




 "I'm no where near finished with you yet, " I say darkly, meaning every word.




We are still alone in the room, but I hear voices coming nearer. "I have to have you in me right now, right away. I need to feel totally connected to you, no separations." I reach down and unzip his pants, and I feel how hard he is.


I rub up and down his cock and he moans, "Bella, Bella, here?"




"That's not a question," I say. "Any objections? That's not a question either." I lift the filmy skirt over him and slightly push myself up to place him at my entrance with my free hand. I'm so wet he slides in slowly and deeply, and I whimper and moan. He is breathing much too fast now.




"Please, please slow down, slower," I say. I sigh and just hold him in me as I feel him so deep. People are coming in now, so I don't move a muscle, keeping my head turned into his neck, my mouth open against his artery and licking and sucking quietly.




"Oh, god Bella, I can't stand this," he says.




"Yes, we can and we will, as long as we can. But I don't know how long I can hold out. Either." The tourists look at us and see two people in each other's arms, cuddling, and that's all.




They begin murmuring as they look at the paintings. I feel when they are looking at Edward's painting. They just become silent and stand there. There is nothing to say.



...In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo...





Our breathing quiets. I tighten my muscles around him and feel him twitch. I move just a millimeter down on him and it feels so much deeper that I sigh deeply. I quiver internally and my desire increases.




This man will be the death of me. I tell him, "You will be the death of me." He tightens his hold on me and I gasp in surprise.




 "Oh god, Edward I feel you inside me, all over. I could let go and come right this minute. But I won't. I'm not finished with you."




He groans imperceptibly, so only I can hear him. His voice is a sound that vibrates deep inside me and I tremble. He feels me respond and hums in my ear. I am coming undone.




"Stop, slower," I say. "Slower, slower." And I still and calm my breathing and he joins me until we are at the edge, quietly holding ourselves there. No frenzy. Yet. "I love you so much I can scarcely believe it," I say.




"I know," he says. "It is the same for me. I have never loved anyone before. This is completely new for me. I cannot believe it. I don't think I will ever believe it either. How did this happen? Who started it. Not a question."




I glue myself to his chest and raise myself a little and then sink down hard and fast. The air whooshes out of his lungs, and I begin trembling again. I love to make him lose control.




More people are coming into the room, so I am very very still. I feel Edward tense, but I am relaxed. I know how they are seeing us. Indulgently. Young lovers. Remember when we were…., but oh they have no idea, none at all. I wrap my cunt around him now. Each muscle strokes him, circles him, my lower muscles squeeze him.




"My throat is better," I say. "My muscles are more delineated, separate, more controlled." He trembles in me, longing for that sensation.



...I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each,
I do not think that they will sing to me.



"Do you know that there are Asian prostitutes who can smoke cigarettes with their cunt?" They tighten like this," and I show him and he breathes sharply in.




His hands move to my shoulders and he bears down. My breath catches, and I breathe deeper. I lose control and begin trembling. My insides are quivering spontaneously. I have lost all control and I just hold him and tremble. I tighten and loosen on him, feeling him all around me inside me. I want to keep him there forever. Yes, that's what I want . To have him inside me forever. How can I ever feel full again if he leaves me? That is a question? And I know the answer to it. I can't. Not ever.




"Oh, please," I say. "Oh please."




"Oh please, what?" he says. "Tell me and it's yours."




"You," I say.




"But you already have me."




"But not forever like this," I say. "I can't keep you inside me forever."




"But you can," he says. "Let me in your womb. I want all of me in your womb. Forever."




And then my body leaves me and decides for itself, quivering around him, hugging him, letting go, then tightening again so hard he couldn't get out. But he doesn't want to. I am gasping for breath. All my well trained internal muscles, ready for this for centuries, fall apart and throb.




"Each time my walls caress you is like each of those brushstrokes inside one of those fragments. You are hard in me, but oh so soft too. There are thousands of those fragments in your painting, and I am going to love you for each one of them, holding you softly, firmly, sometimes sloppily, but hold you I will. Once for each fragment in time your body and mind anticipated me, desired me, as you endlessly painted that painting and waited for me. This is what you were waiting for."




And I begin to fall apart yet again.




I have a little "tooth" deep in my vagina, right by my cervix where it opens into my womb. I feel it opening now. I put that piece of flesh over his urethra and gently at first circle it. I begin to probe his opening harder then more and more until I feel him reach the edge.


I let go and pulse and say, "My birth control is 99.95 percent effective. We have a point 05 chance. Break down my barrier. Break it down! Stay in me forever."




He doesn't let go. He ejaculates, hard, far up into me, jetting me with his semen until all my insides are covered and soaked. I feel his hands bear down on my shoulders so hard I think I will push through his thighs into the bench. I love it.




Then I feel my cervix open wide to embrace him and I shudder again and come all over him, making waves that push him further inside me all the way. Still he continues to ejaculate in me deeper and deeper. And then I know. I am conceiving. I relax and just breathe, holding him in my arms and cunt.




"I have conceived," I say.




"How can you know that."




"I just know."




"You could be mistaken."




"The Sibyl is never mistaken." I do not mention twins.




And then he looks up at me with such radiant joy on his face I think I will die.
Sky Cathedral - Nevelson





Nevelson -Sky Gate
I have started another one. A crossover between Georges in Bel Ami (Guy de Maupassant) and Lily Bart in House of Mirth (Edith Wharton)
so start at the top here



End of Part 1

Irresistible Destiny:Chapter 17 - Waiting and Longing



Books » 310 series » Twilight: Impossible Destiny
Author: seymourblogger
Rated: M - English - Fantasy/Romance - Published: 08-31-11 - Updated: 09-09-11id:7342016
Twilight: Irresistible Destiny

Other Criteria - Leo Steinberg
"Yet it depressed me and I wasn't sure why."
In the works of Jasper Johns, Steinberg identifies a theme of great
consequence that is not clear to the naked eye, that of waiting.
Steinberg points out the "sense of desolate waiting" in Johns's
works, which all contain objects (flags, faces, coat hangers, etc.)
designed to move and function in a particular way, yet they are held
absolutely rigid and still. This technique, according to Steinberg, is
how Jasper Johns manages to invert the viewer's expectations of
what makes for significant art.



Jorge Luis Borges

“Being with you and not being with you is the only way I have to measure time.”

Jasper Johns


EPOV




I'm watching her look at my painting. I wish I could read her mind. She is thoughtful, quiet, absorbed. I sit very still so as not to disturb her. It's a very large painting and most people look at it from a distance, but Bella gets up and moves in close.






Now her perspective is the same as my own when I was painting it. So I know she is looking carefully at each brushstroke, noticing each slight variation in color. I hope I am being as still as the bench I am sitting on, but I am anxious to know what she sees, because I know she is seeing me as well, and is not just observing it as a painting.






She stands relaxed in front of it. I notice when her breathing pattern changes and I wonder what she sees and feels that lead to that change. Something is affecting her, but I have no idea what. When she finishes, she turns to me to walk over and looks at me with huge eyes.






"I see what you meant when you said what you said the other day. I am not sure I would have been brave enough to meet you after seeing this.






She sits down beside me then and tells me all that was going through her head while I was wondering. And I am completely surprised.






She says, "Leo Steinberg wrote about Jasper Johns first show, and how everything screamed waiting, solitary waiting, endless waiting. Hangers waiting. Partial plaster faces waiting.




"But I see your waiting very differently.






"Your very action in painting is inscribing your feelings, your touch with the brush, your nuances of the same color over and over, as just a focused time while you wait.




You paint a painting that will take forever to finish so you will be interested while you wait. And it is clear that you are going to wait forever, for your entire life if necessary, so no wonder you memorized Duras statement on loving, longing and waiting.






"It's so beautiful Edward. I am changed forever knowing that you were waiting for me and would wait your entire life for me. You told me in words, but now I see it, feel it, and am changed by that knowing. I tremble over that and chance and Destiny. What if…."






And I hush her with my fingers and pull her to me as her eyes fill up with tears that spill over at an imagined loss and desolation.




Brancusi - Kiss


"I can't even think about not having you now. And I've just had you for a few days. I've been without you my whole life up to now. How did I live? The truth is, I wasn't. I was just surviving."






And she turns in my arms on the bench and puts her arms around me and just holds on for dear life. She is weeping silently and trembling against me. "Don't ever leave me. I will die if you do."






I laugh at her and say, "After waiting that long do you even think it is possible for me to consider it?" And I hold her tighter.




We breathe together and sit very still here in front of my painting, sit still on the hard bench holding each other.






"I think I would like to wait another time for us to see the other one. Will you go along with that. That's not a question."




She laughs but doesn't move away from my arms. I caress her face, drawing my fingers over her cheekbones, down her neck to her throat, and on down over her breasts, her waist, her stomach, her thighs, her legs to her feet. I bring my face close to hers and softly kiss her face, neck, throat and then I turn her face so I can cover her lips with mine. I hold us like that as we breathe together.






"Oh," she says, and kisses me harder as if she will never let me go. If she does, I won't let her.

Irresistible Destiny:Chapter 16 - Waiting



Books » 310 series » Twilight: Impossible Destiny
Author: seymourblogger
Rated: M - English - Fantasy/Romance - Published: 08-31-11 - Updated: 09-09-11id:7342016
Twilight: Irresistible Destiny

"Don't you see yourself in every picture you love? You feel a radiance wash through you. It's something you can't analyze or speak about clearly. What are you doing at that moment? You're looking at a picture on a wall. That's all. But it makes you feel alive in the world. It tells you yes, you're here. And yes, you have a range of being that's deeper and sweeter than you knew."




He watched her. He didn't think he wanted to be surprised, even by a woman, this woman, who'd taught him how to look, how to feel enchantment damp on his face, the melt of pleasure inside a brushstroke or band of color. (Cosmopolis 30)

Resnick
Resnick in those years as "The Elephant in the Room," with its only geometry a thick hide of dark oils. And the closer one looks, the murkier and more colorful it becomes. 

Resnick makes the determination of Piet Mondrian or Ad Reinhardt and their asceticism look like child's play. He has worked each canvas hard, until it has no sense left of color or form, much as Josef Albers worked over spatial relationships until they stopped moving or Cy Twombly worked the trace of his hand until trace itself becomes something out of a myth. Resnick keeps everything about a generation except a world beyond ideas.

I found this by surprise




BPOV


We are in the Biennale and walking to see Edward's paintings. I only see one. "Where is the other one you said was here?"




"Around the corner. It's very different but also the same."




I look at it from far away as I walk towards it. I stop to look at it from a distance, before I sit down on the bench in front of it to look.




Edward waits on the bench farther back and is very quiet and still.




It is ten feet across and 6 feet down; really huge, not for just anyone to buy and put in a room in their house. It would require an extraordinary house to frame it properly. Or a corporate lobby.




It is very dark and mysterious. Blacks, deep blues, greens, browns, each stroke of color just slightly different in shade. I wonder if each deep blue has been slightly changed to make it qualitatively different from every other area of deep blue.
Louise Nevelson - Night Image




I would bet money on it.




Diagonally from the left is an infinitesimal slash of subtly curving light, a razor thin sliver, cutting across, off center, to the far right corner, which it doesn't reach. It might have been lightening striking if it were a landscape, but it is not.




Perhaps it could be seen as an abstract landscape. On either side of the bright illuminating, but so thin slice of bright cut of light, I can see more detail. It is as if the cut allowed more of something hidden to be observed for an instant. But it is unclear whether this is a sudden flash, partly or wholly permanent. And it arouses disturbing feelings in me. I feel very apart from Edward right now, maybe separated is the word.




The title plate says: Foucault's Transgression




I feel solitary and alone looking at it. Apprehensive, and a little afraid. I get up and walk closer, then closer still. It is not meant to be seen up this close. But that's the way I want to see it. It is composed of thousands of tiny fragments, like tiny mirrors of darkness, slivers, with each one containing a world in it and I shiver. Pieces that look as if they compose a whole, but do not. The edges of each are sharp, and I feel I could slice my finger on them. But the brush strokes inside are sometimes soft, liquid, runny, curving, gloppy, and razor sharp. I shiver again.






Softness and vulnerability contained by edges, but the fragments are so small that they are not noticeable unless you are observing very carefully. Along the light slash there is a low illumination and there the fragments have softer edges. The paradox of hard edges in darkness and softer edges in low light is also disturbing. Now why would that be?




I continue to sit and breathe, feeling strangely isolated. I imagine Edward painting it. The almost finicky detail of the fragments, and the endless concentration and focus to do each one so perfectly. The very thin cut of light crossing the canvas, pulling the eye across and curving down on the diagonal, forcing the viewer to see it the way he wants you to see it, moving your eye the way he has decided you will move it.




Controlling your vision.




He is slicing the world, killing it, and loving it at the same moment. The brightness offers a respite, an abandonment of pure brushstrokes, sensuous and unashamed. Brushstrokes of an almost illumination reflecting from the bright line of light across this world.




So if I were seeing this, and I didn't know him, I would be afraid of knowing him, I think. Complex and paradoxical, a slicing killer inside and the softness and vulnerability of a child. But which layer is predominant? Will he kill you first and then feel remorse? Or will he seduce you with his sensuality and then knife you, slice you, kill you.




I think of his painting it, the incredible detail, the focus and concentration eating and devouring time. Then I know he is simply waiting. Waiting alone, for what he does not know.




And then I know the bright light is me. And around me it is a little clearer, a little lighter, although not a great deal. The fragments, however, have soft edges and inside they are quivering and vulnerable, sensitively touched with the barest pressure of fingertips. I have felt his violence. I have felt his complete vulnerability in me. And he has felt all this in me. We are each other's match.




I catch my breath and turn to him. He is looking at me and waiting.




His eyes are not cold, not impersonal, but not lustful either. He is just waiting.




I decide to go with the truth.