correspondence with zack

Zack,
I've never been in love so i'll take your word for it. Most days i feel like that lady in The Hours. I read and read and read. The world that exists in books seems richer somehow. Sometimes,this living business is a tough.

I had the oddest bit of help and advice today. There's thsi distant relative of my gran who's a masseuse. She comes to the house every so often. As she was giving me a massage,she told me;in very hushed tones,that my mother knew i was dating a man of Chinese descent. I was shocked as i had not told this even to my mum. I did remember telling my maid once. The context in which i had confided in my gran's helper(with the apparently futile do-not-tell-mum please request) was after another fight with my mum. As everyone has been telling me,the only way out is to get married. So,i told my maid that was unlikely to happen aytime soon as the person i am dating is chinese and works as a teacher (he lectures at a private college to matriculation students). She was upset when she found out.

Now,i haven't told mum because for some odd reason my family don't like me dating Chinese,indian,caucasian or any other race. It's odd because my mum's cousins have mostly married Caucasians. My mum's sister married an Indian fellow. Our family is mixed blood as we have Chinese,Portuguese,Indian,Arab,Javanese blood.

The thing is Zack,i know he'll leave in January. I just want to be happy for once even if it's just for a year. When anything happens,i keep in mind i have only this one year and try to spend as much time i can with him. I also have to spend time with my family,do errands,work,play tennis (we won Gold as a team),do part-time jobs,do researcg and study. Some days i wish i could cry off and ask my family to back off. I get text messages everyday from my mother to say "be back early","be considerate and be back early","where are you?","what time does work finish and what time will you be back".Every day. It is unbearable. Most days i wish she will get better Soon and go back to her own house and get out of my face.

I am very grateful for all my friends (even though my family begrudges the time i spend with them too). Thank you for writing and the poems and the support.

You know,when i read that sonnet of baudelaire's;he doesn't seem vile. However,with his history in mind;you know he's not real enough.

I'll forward you a photo of the both of us.

dian



Zachary Chartkoff wrote:
My dearest Dian ~

I am sooooooooooooo glad you are in love! I know the interet is a poor medium to judge excitment and tone of voice (I mean, it's flat writing) but I am grinning really big on your behalf. Partly because I am honored you can trust me, partly because you seem happy in your letter (believe me, happiness is so very valuable) and partly because I think you are wonderful and feel gifted I can spend even a little time with you in this life.

Tell Mark I would be delighted if he read my poetry and if was up to sharing some of his own work I would be excited to see it. There is no hurry, though. It's sort of like my letter writing, I have never been known for my swift replies but I am working on that, though with a lot of my ideas it seems to take a bit longer in real-time than the wild world of cyber space =)

In the meantime let me fill you in with life ... translating in the morning and working in the evenings. I have been trying to get Baudelaire's sonnet, "Parfum Exotique," into English. It is hard!

I never realized how much I dislike the man! Baudelaire lived in Paris, in the 1840s and 1850s. He was middle-class, taken to living off the allowance his mother gave him and fond of prostitutes and absinthe. What this means is he developed various venereal diseases that stayed with him his entire adult life and which he apparently passed onto all his lovers. In many of his poems there is a figure of a certain woman, who Baudelaire refers to as "quadroon," or "octoroon," an outdated term meaning a person having one-quarter African ancestry, named Jeanne Duval. He enhales a mysterious perfume on her and starts to imagine the island she came from (maybe the Caribbean somewhere). That's the idea of the poem.

I think the poem was probably very shocking 150 years ago, when the ruling elite didn't fall in love with people of other races. But now Baudelaire is just what we call a "racist and sexist," in my circles of friends. I suppose what was once seen as forbidden or taboo is now common. Common is not a bad thing, you know, it means we are no longer scandalized by the other people (the poem I would love to read would be Jeanne Duval's reply to Baudelaire, maybe it would go: "After giving me the gonorrhea, I lay next/ to your pasty flesh and smell all of Paris'/ sewer system in one of your rotten kisses ..." but sadly, we do not have that poem ... I have the feeling Baudelaire was not very clean).

What else can I tell you? It is turning warm outside. I spent some time outside planting tulip bulbs in the ground so in July or so I will have beautiful flowers. Soon I will want to get out my jogging shoes and go running down by the river. True, it is very stinky and there is trash floating in the water sometimes, but at least I will be outside. That is good. How is the weather with you? How can you tell when it will be springtime?

I hope all is good with you and you will write soon. Give my best to Mark and please take care of yourself.

your friend,
Zachary

.........................................................

Quand, les deux yeux fermés, en un soir chaud d'automne,
Je respire l'odeur de ton sein chaleureux,
Je vois se dérouler des rivages heureux
Qu'éblouissent les feux d'un soleil monotone;

Une île paresseuse où la nature donne
Des arbres singuliers et des fruits savoureux;
Des hommes dont le corps est mince et vigoureux,
Et des femmes dont l'oeil par sa franchise étonne.

Guidé par ton odeur vers de charmants climats,
Je vois un port rempli de voiles et de mâts
Encor tout fatigués par la vague marine,

Pendant que le parfum des verts tamariniers,
Qui circule dans l'air et m'enfle la narine,
Se mêle dans mon âme au chant des mariniers.

..............................................

Bewitching, on an autumn night with eyes
closed I breathe in the musk of your breasts, see
far off shores, atolls, all bright and happy
under a dazzling, endless sunrise.

Lazy island, where Nature breeds countless
wondrous trees and fruits of weird delight,
and whose men, with their lithe bodies, invite
women, whose eyes flash with lewd directness.

Lured by your scent to an isle so charming,
I see a port full of sail, mast, rigging
all still weary from the ocean's furies

while the tamarind trees breathe their flavor
to please my senses with greedy pleasure,
mingled with sailor's sea-songs and chanteys.