Preface by Violet Franke
The last of the four-volume series of the Polyamorous Love Letters, talks with a much older and wiser voice that time has endowed the lovers. This volume covers a final journey, and many reflections that cover love, intimacy, sex, and the topics that are typically associated with the insight that comes with many years.
Simply put, the author walks us down a path, that has some solemn conclusions. She talks of their connection as something that the universe has conspired to create. And ties a thread of existence right back through the letters, to the positivity that resided in her heart’s conception from the very start of the correspondence. The reader will be left to contemplate age, and poignancy of fate and luck and love. How the three make happy bedfellows of most people’s live. The universality of love, death, time, and growing old together, if you are lucky enough, becomes a precious jewel that the author has allowed to be polished over the 88 letters and four volumes of PLL.
It has been an honour to write the prefaces, belonging to such a lovely musing of layers of fiction, sentiment and memory. Definitely, it was a path worth walking along for this privilege reader. I hope you have enjoyed it too, and will be suitably satisfied with the closure of volume four.
Clarity
This series is my last attempt to pen my love to you. I know that age has brought many things. Desperation. Preciousness. And clarity. It’s like I can see for miles, and all I can do is smile. With tears sometimes overrunning their bath. Little things have passed under the bridge, and I now swim naked in every moment. Just about.
Our old bodies great each other still with all the vigour and flavour of so many years of love. I never would have envisioned that we would all still be together after so long. It’s funny what appreciation can bring. And now the silences are gentle. Like the air just moves between us. Are while we are well known to each other, love always surprises. She still holds me before sex, and you still hold me after. After so long. Love has persisted.
If I told you, that someone said in my early years, that seeking the love of more than one at a time, is selfish and sinful. The talk was always that it should not be done. That I would suffer in damnation. But be damned I might be, that love has found me and stayed this long long time. I’d have never thought that being courageous enough to love – to allow love to love, would have lasted this long and so beautifully. It was merely a dream. One that you both have made come true. Far from bringing a cloud over my eyes, you have both lifted darkness away with your light. And now we have made an older age. That the early courage we had to start this love, has never seemed to dim in my memory. For I am reminded of it every time I see you both. Every time I am held.
Courage
Like the sea I have become in my older years. Such a pulling of the tides. But my hat still stays on in all the weather. Kahlil Gibran talks about a need for a rudderless boat to sail the wider seas. Inferring I think, that you need to let go of control to handle the big waves and currents. And even to let go of a destination. Death comes to us all. And we are returned to some kind of atoms. Some kind of sand on the shore.
The older I have become, the more I can find the time to reflect on my parents. The legacy of courage that they embedded. The way they smiled and wailed at death. There was simply too much of it to bear, to be honest. Long illnesses bring such a heavy unforgiving weight. But now I have found it has fortified my older years. And I get to share this with both of you. I get to sprinkle the way they laughed through adversities. The way they aged together by circumstance. But with you both, it has been free will and Love that has brought us closer in time. It is a chance to continue to experience and explore ourselves. To share. To laugh. To cry. And again, I say, to breathe.
Courage like the sea I tell you. And all the white horses…
Courage like the sea I tell you. And all the white horses…
Inspiration
I want you both to know how you inspire me. Space and time and focus leads me to create, but the muse starts long before that. Your presence. Your love. Keeps feeding me. Even nothing has to come from something. And I am forever collecting breadcrumbs in my mind as I walk along life’s paths. I do not know when exactly nothing becomes something. But everything comes from something else.
I am very lucky in life to have had so many wonderful friends who inspire me to breathe. To get out of bed. To make the most of things. Everyday. Not to take life for granted. There is always the possibility for a setback. And when encountered I would tell myself, that fear means a challenge. And challenge means an opportunity. And I always think, that really you create your own luck. At least consider every opportunity, and take up most of them. Never let an experience past you by. I certainly lived that way most of my life. Life itself has been the inspiration in that sense. And it has brought me to you both. The muse. The spark. The considerations. The embrace of Love. Waters my soul. And keeps me away from the desert.
Black and White Television
Take me back in my older age. Take me back to sitting around the fire with only one TV in the house, and no colour pictures to be seen. Where Mr Ed and Leave It To Beaver would bring all of those amazing accents and talking horses.
Take me back in my older age. Take me back to sitting around the fire with only one TV in the house, and no colour pictures to be seen. Where Mr Ed and Leave It To Beaver would bring all of those amazing accents and talking horses.
Sometimes my eyes falter. Sometimes I dream in black and white. Like the story is from a long time ago. And some times more often now, I listen to the music from even before my time. Even before TV.
Now I lay with you in my arms that have seen so much pleasure, holding us together after a dance. Some of that older music drifting in through the open door. Where I wear my best dress, and you twirl me around the lounge. Not even bothering a cat. Somehow, the black and white television, means that we had to colour in the gaps. There was some mystery about it. Like there is about getting older. You really don’t know what tomorrow brings. Or doesn’t bring. But that old music and memory brings sentiment that cannot be washed away. At least, not while I am alive. I would love to hear of the way both of your beings were shaped before colour TV, if you can have the time to sit and tell me? I do not want another day to pass, where our pasts are forgotten like an old script on the floor.
My heart’s journey
Some people talk about their lives looking back as life events. But there is another way. I often prefer to look back at how life twisted and turned from one connection to another. From one love to another. And meeting you both was one of those junctions. I fell in love with each of you in a few short seconds. And it reminded me instantly of the moments that had shaped my life before then. Our eyes meet. We smile and laugh. The notes between the spaces. We plant a seed in our soul. Then we touch. And we listen. And we listen some more. Then we talked about our attraction. Only to confirm it with a kiss.
So I look back and can clearly see how my first love, brought me to my last loves. And brought me to you both. In time to save me from the desert. You poured water into my mouth. And wrapped me in the fine silk of our skins. And even still now, whisper in my ears that you love me. It is such a beautiful surrender that we are growing old together. I never regret a twist and turn that brought me here to your lips. xx
Liminality
It is one of my favourite concepts and words Liminality. And being conscious of it existing in my being sometimes makes me sad. But it is as undeniable as death. Every time I cross a doorway, I reminded of my own posit. Flying from one tree to another in the darkness with other Owls. I remember what it was like to be seen in Youth. To have my agency recognised. For it to be a tool to trade with. Now. My same eyes see the world. But the world sees my eyes differently now I am older. If it was not for my connection with the two of you, I would have become completely invisible. I would have disappeared into the ether. And may have not even existed. If it were not for Love that has saved me. You both see me. You both know I float in the light of liminality. Like an old gas lamp in the dark. I again thank you both for finding me in the first instance, and staying in love with me in the second. We have formed our own parliament through the years. Many sittings and debates. Many consultations up late. And a good few whiskeys. And every night I sit in my canoe, and balance. Returning myself to my favourite tree in the woods, and just watching life in wonder and opportunity. Really indeed. It is much luck that we ever found each other and survived. Staying visible, even in our later years, if only for each other.
A place for old jewels
Listen. I still demand our sex. I still stand and say I want you, and I need you. And I have a string of pearls right know on me, to prove that to you both. It reminds me of a place within. A place for my old jewels to continue to be polished. While I work. While I sit. While I play or rest. I remember when she was there to help me choose them. And I remember when I asked him to help me insert them. There was always a place for jewelry in my life. And there is still this place for old jewels. Like a tattoo I wear my pearls. And nobody can see them in the smile I wear. Except for you both. If you ever need to enter to visit, please just knock. I will always have room for you. xx
Youth
I am not dead yet. I wear my flume like a plume on a rooster. It is bold and yet fine like silk. Layered in memories and scars from a lived life. And life keeps me dancing still. Sometimes it is the salsa and rumba. Bright lights just focused on us. Sometimes it is a silly jig on my own on the kitchen floor. We are lucky to be able to still move together. Life has not plucked our last feathers yet. And you don’t mind hearing the stories of my youth tumble out of my mouth. Even some years back in the second half of my life, I was making new steps. It was youthful once again, to try something new. And the flame withing leaped and jumped and swirled. And got ravelled up in all sorts. My heart catching wind of love in a mere few seconds of passing. Like a smell in the wind. But that maturity of age. Keeping me in reality. And then I have your love. Your flume and memories and scars. The pasts that inform the present. The way youth has built a time machine within our minds if only to share. It means that youth has always been with me. I am blessed not to have forgotten. And it reminds me of the seeds of love, that tilled the soil. That is our garden. xx
Wealth
Time has afforded many things. Our friendship being the most priceless. And the mere things we accumulate, we cannot take with us into the next. I saw the value of things from youth. Generations treat things differently of course. Even love.
I am not here to collect you and own you. But the friendship that supports our ongoing loves, leaves me rich beyond belief quite often. And time only makes it all the more valuable. Our words are like the furnishings of a room, where I can lay naked in Winter. Our older skins treating each other like a precious element. Elemental. Wonder. And yet we met because of things. Although they were intangible things. Like music. Like poetry. There was still a need for an instrument. For a pen and paper. And money buys these things. It empowers the user to create love. To attract love. And we have been like moths to the lights. Our wealth now accumulates with every word. Every kiss. Every breath. We are wealthy beyond belief.
I thank goodness that we ever met.
Strength
My body is a little weaker than in Youth, but my passion has found a direction in old age that has cured the concrete of my soul. There were times in life where I have been reduced to kneeling and wailing on the ground. Stripped bare. Empty. And yet overflowing.
I have now lived with you both through so many good years. I know that the twilight brings goodbyes. But I hope that the strength we have brewed in each other means that any storm that comes mellows into just our vital teas leaves at the bottom of the cup. Like one last drink together. I know our health will be the end of each of us. But if I could pray, I would ask for eternity. Just one last time.
I hope that she and he realise just how much I owe to you. My ancestors in fact owe a dept of gratitude for that Love that you have grown in me. On every visit. With such care and maturity and joy. All I want this letter to say is thank you. Once again, our dance continues to restore me. And. You both endear me with a strength of Love that I never found anywhere else.
Ice cream and false teeth
I never wanted false teeth. But it seems to help when eating food. And provides a frame for a smile. And holds proud my lips that still want to kiss you. I remember when I had the last of my teeth pulled. I lived on ice cream for a week. And still managed not to put on any weight. Still you were both there for me. The meaning of ice cream in my life expanded from having a probability of sex, to ensuring I had some sustenance when unabled. You see, I am sure I told you. Of a social anthropology project I once did, that looked at how ice cream and sex were entwined in marketing. And then came false teeth. And you still loved me. You still wanted to see me smile. You still wanted intimacy. And you still wanted me to try and keep them in when laughing in hysterics. Or ranting at the tele. And you both have somehow kept your teeth. I tell you, you’ve missed out on the pleasure of eating ice cream for a week. I will have to show you how to do that! Just name the time. xx
Angels on my shoulders
It always feels good to love you both. I am sure you know that feeling. Of looking after another’s heart and at the same time looking after your own. But I always have counted my blessings. Grateful that our paths met. Grateful that the fateful workings of some unknown clock, graced us in time.
I often have thought and agreed that if there is a God, then it is the kindness of people that does God’s work. But you are both steady on my shoulders. Day after night after day. Watching out for me. Hoping that you will be there to catch me if I fall. Or even fall apart. I know that without that grace in my life, I would not have met you. And we would be three. Adrift and lost at sea. Rudderless again taking on the giant swells of life. Solely getting by on the kindness of strangers. But here we are. My shoulders love having you visit. Your angelic promise grazing my skin like wings. So again, I must simply say thank you. For making my life. Beautiful. Lovely. And kind.
Thank You.
I often have thought and agreed that if there is a God, then it is the kindness of people that does God’s work. But you are both steady on my shoulders. Day after night after day. Watching out for me. Hoping that you will be there to catch me if I fall. Or even fall apart. I know that without that grace in my life, I would not have met you. And we would be three. Adrift and lost at sea. Rudderless again taking on the giant swells of life. Solely getting by on the kindness of strangers. But here we are. My shoulders love having you visit. Your angelic promise grazing my skin like wings. So again, I must simply say thank you. For making my life. Beautiful. Lovely. And kind.
Thank You.
Performativity
It is the cliché, that I am simply and still, playing a young person in an older person’s body. It is a performance on the outside, but a solidification on the inside. I remember reading about Judith Butler’s (1991) notion of performativity in studies as a young pup. She was basically inferring that our clothes wear us. We do not wear them. As an older lady, I feel like I have been able to act on the stage of our loves, in many skins like a technicolour coat. It is a common comment that we are still young at heart even in our older years. But I think it is more than that, that our love has revealed to me. It is my core. It is the essential love in my heart and its conception that has been my constant companion. That has brought me here to love you both. So completely. I do not know what lies after death. I do not know if our souls will seek out each other in the next lives, to live such beauty over again. I am spending more time in this beautiful twilight. Reflecting. Noticing how calm and loved I often feel. How I have come to understand myself. And how I have come to understandings of you. It is a very privileged position to be in. I do not take the journey for granted. And every time I kiss you it is like a thousand wishes coming true. And we will never know when that feeling will end. Sow. I make a toast to you both on this cool Winters night.
While we last!
While we last!
Sexuality
There would always be currents running through me and around me. There would always be moments. The wind in my hairs. A taste on my tongue. A smile in my eyes. But you both brought me to new waters. Where I swim with delight. In the quiet. In the mist. And in the sun.
It was then I realised that I had always been a mermaid. That I could life my tail hi to wave to another. That I could swim for many miles. And hold my breathe when required. If only sometimes for the rest of society’s shame.
It was then I realised that I had always been a mermaid. That I could life my tail hi to wave to another. That I could swim for many miles. And hold my breathe when required. If only sometimes for the rest of society’s shame.
Now I have swam for many many years with you. My scales are not the first I started with. My lashes that dashed at you. Are not the ones from my birth year. And I lay here with my kind, and your kindness. On a beautiful private beach that is my sanctuary. The current stirs in me, even with a glance or pause. With a laugh. Or wry smile. And for as long as I can, I will continue to raise my tail hi out of the water to waive to you. To call you in. To the next embrace. To the next meeting of our lips. Where our kind and loving words can kiss each other hello and goodnight.
Wisdom
Wisdom has been a bonus to carry for this long road. And every time I see you both, you have made a contribution to its ocean. Knowingly, I felt wise in Youth, but then was a fool many times over. Knowingly I found my way to you both. How ever did that happen O sow long ago. Really wisdom has become the silences in our speech. The space between each glance and smile. The way we breath together when we make love. I understand that I can not pack it all up and take it with me when I go. Even more motivation to enjoying the sitting while I am here. I do fear the loss of you. I understand now why my parents wanted to out live the other – to spare the other the loss. The absence. The complications. The emotion. The paperwork. You are both wise in my eyes. I love how you hold space for me. I love how you listen. And I love how you love. Thank you for always rising me up and keeping me spontaneously humble. Just the right amount of sun and water. And always up for conversation.
Thank you xx
Unhappiness
When I met you, I had finally realised that expecting another person to be a solution – to make you happy - is ridiculous. It is a path that only leads to unhappiness and resentment. I set myself free and wandered for a while. Just amongst my thoughts. Amongst my love. Some time alone I spent. Some nights I would imagine that I was alone on a plateau in the mountains. Far away from everything. But closer to myself. I wondered if I would ever let love into my heart again. In the end, I decided not to worry about the other. Just focus on making myself worthy of love if it was to ever come along. I’d throw more wood on the fire. I’d forgive myself for taking the low road. And realise that I am just where ever it is I am meant to be.
I still get unhappiness, but it seems to wash off. I don’t appreciate cut flowers because I just sit and watch them die. But I do continue to plant new plants, even in this old age. Many things will out live me. But my unhappiness I think I have outlived.
A Price for Love
I am telling you, you have outlived him. And I have outlived his love. The price for love is the pain of missing him. The loss and emptiness. Yet somehow it is okay to talk about death. Now that I myself am old enough to die without question.
This grief I must bear. Alone. And yet I know you feel the grief for me too. None of us wanted to see each other’s hearts broken. But there is a cycle of life that cannot be denied. And some how I will find acceptance. People seems to say, “Well at least you have some lovely memories.” But the ethereal does not replace a person in your life. All I will know that I will continue loving him, just like I will continue to love you. And celebrate continuing the bond. And I am O’sow glad I have you to share that celebration with. I am so glad that monogamy did not cast me out on the street. That I can fall into your arms still. And melt like snow. I know someday we will part. But we are ravelled up together in time. Our hair braided by our love. In separable and lovely. Thank you for still being in my life. And especially at this time. I love you more than you’ll ever know.
Celebration II
Really this letter to you is about acceptance. I have to let him go in peace. I have to celebrate him, and then let him go. Will you come to the dance and let me reminisce? I remember writing to you both about his gentleness. And that turned out to always be attractive. The way he would enjoy a glass of wine with me. The way he let me talk about you endlessly when you and I fell in love. He just smiled a quiet, joyful smile. He just held space for me to be myself. Just like you do also. It is like every encounter is the creation of a new installation. And now I find my eyes filling up. Again. My bladder must be reaching my eyeballs as I overflow. And I you. I need you to hold me still. His passing was unexpected. Yet all three of us have been getting older. The heart only has so many beats. And then a last exhalation. Thank you for being there for me. Grief can be heavy. But his love. Like yours. Is both beautifully concise, and wonderfully expansive. At the same time. I cannot help but ask you to accept my celebration of his bond. And only God knows how you and I will outlive each other. In the meantime, all I can do is love you. Thank Goodness. xx
Needs
It’s funny now that we still need each other in older age. But for different reasons. I remember our first passionate embrace all those years ago. I remember how you would great me at the door. Disarm me from whatever life was doing. And reach inside.
Sometimes now I still need that from you. And other times, I need you to get to the shops with me. Or the library. Or the doctor. My father said “It takes a lot of guts to get older”. Now I agree. I am still missing him. A space that has been born out of death. And I find myself reliant on you even more. Although my needs have changed.
I hope I can still inspire your love in these older years. Despite sometimes desperately scrambling at our amazing 36 years of time trying to stop the walls from falling in. I know that I am so glad you are still in my life. I do not doubt how rare our meeting has been. And I don’t want to ever let it go. But desperation must wait. You are knocking at my door again. Here to love me and help me. Today, after our chores are done, can we just lay together in the afternoon sun? As the sun streams through the window, we can just pretend to be cats. Without a care in the world. XX
The workings of a clock
Time and fate. Two things that have brought me to you, and you to I. Just like a clock, where the insides were tied with string. He found his way to me in good time. And you came upon me with a chime. All in good time. Sometimes I still dwell on the what if. What if I had not left the house that day. What if that argument we had was the end of us. What if we missed each other all together. The fabric of time woven through some age old positivity, residing in the conception of my heart. And so many steps and twists. And turns. To get here. Pauses and interruptions. Milestones and aimless luck. All folding into one to draw us together. And sometimes, I dwell on the very seconds of time passing. Whether you are here with me or not. How time cannot be lived again. How some kind of conspiracy of love, created us. Now time has aged us. My skin is different skin. But my smile is the same. And these eyes I look through, help me remember all that has been. And my body remembers the rest. Fate has brought us here, and fate will take us away. The universe has grand plans for you and I. And we must make our love available. And it is at any time, we shall have to say goodbye. But only for now. You will never. Lose my love. xx
The Great Surrender
It has taken me along time to get to writing this last letter to you. Too long actually. This damned illness means you will hear my words, but not see them. And sometimes, I think I don’t want to say any last words to you at all. Not ever. And it makes me fierce. But that pain is too young to also make me strong.
How do I say the most important thank you ever? For the experiences that graced us over these last decades. How do I choose the right words from millions of moments, where our love informed millions of decisions. That are now our memories. I hope never to forget.
So the Ferris Wheel has gone round and round, filled with our joy and shiny lights. And this is our last revolution. The Great Surrender. I can barely say the words.
So the Ferris Wheel has gone round and round, filled with our joy and shiny lights. And this is our last revolution. The Great Surrender. I can barely say the words.
Know that I will always love you. I will never stop celebrating our love. Not even till after my last breath. And times when my bladder reaches my eye balls, I will shed a tear. Be it a drop in the ocean. And more than any words could explain.
For the Thanks of Our Love.
May peace be with you as you leave.
Until we meet again. xx
Until we meet again. xx
Goodbyes
I do not know why I am writing to you both. Perhaps to tell you shortly. That this is my last letter. I cannot continue to write to an audience that is no longer there. But what I will do, I will hold tight the collations you made of my letters. The positivity that came from my heart’s conception to yours.
With him, and with her, we skipped and danced. Ravelled and unravelled. We grew and blossomed and watered and held. I was a drop in the ocean. A blade of grass as we laid in the sun. A snowflake in the middle of winter, falling upon your skin. A mermaid, whenever you needed me. And those times. When I could not hold your hand anymore and you held mine.
With him, and with her, we skipped and danced. Ravelled and unravelled. We grew and blossomed and watered and held. I was a drop in the ocean. A blade of grass as we laid in the sun. A snowflake in the middle of winter, falling upon your skin. A mermaid, whenever you needed me. And those times. When I could not hold your hand anymore and you held mine.
So, I have got to say good bye. Because neither of you are here to write to.
But I hope it is not good bye… Just a Fare Ye Well!
But I hope it is not good bye… Just a Fare Ye Well!
I will always love you both.
Thank you being in this life with me.
And I mean it, whenever I say, maybe we will meet again.
And I mean it, whenever I say, maybe we will meet again.
Forever in my soul. xx
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