you are anais nin to me. did you know that? the poet and the enigmatic keeper of the erotic, the mind embracing secrets (you leave them on napkins at the bar)--the body shall not reveal.

i see you as through silk scarves multicolored, translucent, embroidered with gold, shimmering in the light and me alternately crouching and then again on tiptoe, squinting to discern what patterns are truly drawn on your body and what patterns you seduce the light into dappling you with.

your face is not your face, nor your body your body. they are just human. arms, legs, eyes, the wrinkles which define lips and noses. flesh--all that stuff of passion and wickedness--can be torn aside like rice-paper in anyone's hand. you can't fool me. i know a sliver of what grandeur goes on underneath and inside of all that flesh (passion, wickedness, poetry, and sex).

your body does not betray you as nexus of the erotic, as watcher and revealer--and i won't either.

at least, no more than this.

i just wanted you to know how thoroughly i admire you, orangepeeler/anais. (perhaps it is all very bold, but i figured--it is possible that every now and then we need a love letter from someone who isn't, nor has been, nor is likely ever to be a lover.)

much love, affection, and consummate appreciation,

ariana