L'esprit de l'amour

When I was a young girl, a high school student in my late teens, I would take the Trailways bus to Woodstock, New York, and there I met the most enchanting fellow. His name was David, and he was a student at the Art Student's League. We met through a friend of mine, Sandy, who had a huge crush on him.

I don't think David and I exchanged more than a dozen words once in front of Sandy's cottage, and another time when we ran into each other on Tinker Street in town. A very bizarre thing happened, something that has not happened often since. I couldn't get him out of my mind.

On the ride home to Queens, David's face would appear in a mass of clouds out the window, and his long blonde hair, and slender body would emerge in my dreams. My homeroom periods were spent immersed in desire.

After a few weeks, I called the Art Student's League and asked to speak to him. As it happens, David was there, and he came to the phone.

"David, this is Jayne, do you remember me?"

He laughed, and said "Yes, yes, of course."

"I want to come and live with you," I announced. There was about a 30 second delay, and he then said;

"When are you coming? I'll pick you up at the station."

So, I packed my little overnight bag, and left a poem on the pillow, "Telegram," telling my parents that I was off on another adventure, and entreating them not to "take it personally" if I need to escape from time to time.

David and I spent weeks together. We didn't talk. We didn't have to. We made love inside, outside, morning, noon, and night. When we awoke, he knew if I wanted coffee, and vice versa. We were like Adam and Eve in the garden before language, before corruption.

Summer wore on, and I had to go back to school, so I sadly left David who I was to see one more time, the following year, in Woodstock. He looked at me, smiled, and said "I could pick up where we left off, right here, right now, as though time doesn't exist." And indeed it doesn't--not then, and not now.