To: Mathilde Bagnoire
From: Rodrigo Weiss
Date: 03/15/98
Subject: This feeling

Mathilde—

I never knew that this sort of feeling existed. I have had relationships in the past, but have never felt such an intensity. I feel as if I am about to leap off the precipice, but in the full knowledge that I can fly.

Rodrigo


TO: Rodrigo Weiss
FROM: Mathilde Bagnoire
DATE: 03/15/98
SUBJECT: My feeling


Rodrigo—

Having your company for the night was the surest proof that I am actually alive. I have never felt this much a part of the world.

Mathilde


TO: Mathilde Bagnoire
FROM: Rodrigo Weiss
DATE: 03/16/98
SUBJECT: Broomhandle


Mathilde—

Nor have I. I want to hold you all day and night, and feel your cool flesh against mine. When I was a boy, I dreamed about connecting in this way with a woman. I spent much of my time inventing stories about my alter ego, Sir Roderick, and his love the Lady Madeline, who was imprisoned in a coffin of glass. I know, I know, it sounds a lot like Sleeping Beauty—but to my credit, there was no dragon—just an evil witch. And the only way the coffin could be opened was for the Lady Madeline to open it from the inside, so Sir Roderick sent his pet dragonfly Broomhandle through the keyhole to whisper the magic words in the Lady Madeline’s ear. Sometimes the witch captured Roderick as well, and Broomhandle would have to fly through the keyhole of his glass coffin and out into the forest to the witch’s castle where the Lady Madeline was imprisoned. In one particularly inspired variation, Broomhandle had to sacrifice himself for the love of his master by flying into the Lady Madeline’s mouth and becoming the magic words she was required to speak.

I later tried turning these stories into a children’s book, but the publishers to whom I submitted the manuscript felt that its themes were too adult. I include for your amusement the illustration of Broomhandle flying into the Lady Madeline’s mouth, and an “outtake”, from a version in which Sir Roderick first attempts to get the Lady Madeline to say the magic words through a game of charades.

Rodrigo