To: Volsi Mimir who wrote (7453 ) 5/23/2001 1:39:33 AM From: HG Respond to of 13020 Speak to me.....Take my hand.....What are you now ? I will tell you all.....I will conceal nothing. When I was three, a little child read a story about a rabbit who dies, in the story, and I crawled under a chair: a pink rabbit:.....it was my birthday, and a candle burnt a sore spot on my finger, and i was told to be happy. Oh, grow to know me.....I am not happy.....I will be open. Now I am thinking of white sails against a sky like music, like glad horns blowing, and birds tilting, and an arm about me. There was one I loved, who wanted to live, sailing. Speak to me.....Take my hand.....What are you now ? When I was nine, I was fruitily sentimental, fluid: and my widowed aunt played Chopin, and i bent my head on the painted woodwork, and wept. I want now to be close to you.....I would link the minutes of my days close, somehow to your days. I am not happy.....I will be open. I have liked lamps in evening corners, and quiet poems. There has been fear in my life......Someimes I speculate On what a tragedy his life was, really. Take my hand.....Fist my mind in your hand.....What are you now ? When I was fourteen, i had dreams of suicide, and I stood at a steep window, a sunset, hoping toward death: if the light had not melted clouds and plains to beauty, if the light had not transformed that day, i would have leapt. I am unhappy.....I am lonely.....Speak to me. I will be open.....I think he never loved me: he loved the bright beaches, the little lips of foam that ride small waves, he loved the veer of gulls: he said with a gay mouth:I love you.......Grow to know me. What are you now ?.....If we could touch one another, if these our separate entities could come to grips, clenched like a chinese puzzle.....yesterday I stood in a crowded street that was live with people, and no one spoke a word, and the morning shone. Everyone silent, moving.....Take my hand.....Speak to me. <Effort at Speech Between Two People> <Muriel Rukeyser>