July 14, 1989
Dear L,
How should I address you in my love letters? L, my lesbian(ism), my Lover, my love, through the glistening pip, the shining tendril (of) our desire for me, the slender rod registering the relation of your frequency and mine.
My task is to convert you and me to us. You are you . I want you to be separate so that I can feel the thrill of taking (you) over, composing you/me/mine/ours. For a moment I construct you/me: inseparable, just as I write the word ''us'' or we - a rewriting of you/me. A momentary substitution. The ''you'' standing in for you is the machinery that makes these letters possible. Overdrive: overwrite. What is passion without the dream of a resistance, a difference even ever so slight, to be overcome as I push you down on the bed, a distance to be bridged as I cover your body with mine, I orchestrate and perform my desire on your smooth skin, I play the fuck master and take you (in). Perhaps there is not even a sound.
Love,
L
ELIZABETH TO SANDY
L. and L. have many names. As I write this (1996), they are me and Sandy, the woman I love and who makes me want to write love letters and to dream (sem)erotics. We met in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, in 1988, and have lived here together since 1989. In 1993, we celebrated our 90th birthday (my 50th and her 40th). Both of us teach at the University of Alabama.
This letter is reprinted courtesy of New York University Press
from Elizabeth Meese, Sem(erotics): Theorizing Lesbian Writing (New York: NYU Press, 1992)
From the book
DEAR SAPPHO A Legacy of Lesbian Love Letters
by KAY TURNER
Published: THAMES AND HUDSON, 1996
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