To My Gamekeeper

Once upon a time, there was a very lyrical, very sensual writer who captured, most perfectly, the affair of a young wife named Constance and her lover, Oliver Mellors. The novel ended when they each divorced their spouses to live with each other and screw all day. The same writer said this: “Death is the only pure, beautiful conclusion of a great passion.” Now, we’ll never know if Constance and Oliver grew to hate each other or if their romance dissolved or if one of them died, extinguishing their scandalous passion forever. One would assume they went the last way, because their passion was indeed great, but we’ll never know.

I knew him before that night, just because that’s how things are, but I didn’t know him well. After I put out my second-to-last Camel, I heard his voice. Deepest voice I’ve ever heard. He stood very far away so his silhouette was a shadow, which forced me to trek down the wet sidewalk alone. He called again and I followed like Alice down the rabbit hole. Isn’t it always like that, though?

We didn’t touch for a very long time. It’s like we both played that holding out game, but without any rules. We sipped scotch and laughed easily and felt warm with one another. If we touched then, it would’ve been too abrasive--no, it was tender enough, that moment, without touch.

Here’s where the D.H. Lawrence part comes in, if you followed any of the first paragraph. The novel was Lady Chatterley’s Lover and D.H. Lawrence wrote it lastly and it caused quite the literary rebellion. I’ve a very large piece of art on my back, a bit of the writer himself on me forever, and after my deep-voiced lover and I took off shirts, he saw it and stared hard.

Sometimes I forget that my ink is a turn-off to certain guys. Not many, but some. Which is why I’m so glad he saw that one at first and said it was absolutely beautiful. Then, when we lay there afterwards, spent and nearly naked, he traced the one around my hip and said it was equally beautiful. I could have cried I was so thankful to hear that.

I don’t know if you, reader, has ink. I don’t know if you have huge moles, skin tags, scars, acne scars, cuts, bruises…I don’t know if you like being screwed upside down or with a huge dong or with fingers or tongues. I don’t know if you like boys or girls or those in-between. The point I’m trying to make is that when you do find someone who is willing to do these things, to see the most secret crevices and shames of your body and give you incredible pleasure anyway, enjoy it. Please, please, please enjoy it.

He was rough when we played--so rough I can still feel the sting from his hand on my ass or his hold on my throat. “Lampshade” was the safe word. And yet, afterwards or between orgasms, he was the gentle, warm-hearted spirit I knew. He kissed each tattoo, and a few scars for good measure, until a new passion made my belly tingle and I had to have him again.

We fell asleep as many lovers should--entwined and flushed from the inside out. When we awoke, we had each other again, but I remember little. What I do remember is his body pressed against mine, both of us halfway clothed and pulsing and fervent.

We parted sweetly. It was a blue, blue day and his voice was husky and deep as always. I heard it, felt his breath hot on my neck, for the last time.

D.H. Lawrence may have said that Death was the only pure, beautiful conclusion to great passion, but I think he’s being too exclusive with his definition. Great passion is especially fluid because humans have the most fluid of spirits. Maybe I say this now because I’m naive. Or maybe I say this because I’d like to think I’ve had a few young, wild, passionate experiences so far and none of them ended with Death, but they ended purely and most beautifully all the same.

It’s easy, reader, to say that old standby: “Better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all.” Practicing it is much harder. But when I lit up my last Camel, I realized something the grand writer himself might like: I’d rather fling myself into passion, recklessly and destructively and with force, for a short amount of time than to stand back, idle.

So, at last, I tell you this. Be greedy with your passion. Fill yourself with it for as long as you can, because the sweetest moments will end, sometimes by circumstances like distance or temperament or even dark-robed Death, but they will end.

Hold on to those memories and miss them a little or a lot, but never, ever miss out on them.