Portrait

I dreamed of you again last night. I explored your face with my fingertips, like a blind man. It is a face I have glimpsed only in worked photographs, but I have touched it many nights now. The furrows where tears would run if you let them; the eyelids that hood a barely-checked ferocity. I tried to understand how such a stern face can be so warm. I brushed your lips with my index finger. A kiss is beyond even the reach of my dreams, I guess; a tolerant irritated moue was all I would get. It was enough. My hands fell. You tossed your head, a gesture I have guessed from photographs is a characteristic one. Throwing your hair impatiently from your face. Better things to do.

No words. What would I say? I would only lie. Better to stay silent.

I have a long tradition, I suppose, of loving photographs. But that was when I mistook my communion with the photographer for communion with his subject. I am warier now.

Under the gaze of those dispassionate eyes, I hesitate. All right. I made up the dreams. I suppose because it wouldn't be willful self-indulgence, if I had dreamed it. And it wouldn't be part of an even longer tradition of nudging the facts to win indulgences from others. It is both. So -- indulge me. It's little enough I want now. Sire, a man without craves audience.

Lying again. How many times can a person lie, in the course of one short essay? I want everything. You knew that from the start, I'm guessing.