Aaron and Sylvie Stern had a secret. They had a fine house and a trim lawn, they had social standing, they had a sterling country club. They even had a nice credit rating, but with all this they had a secret, too, and one day it sought expression. Secrets do that, like great love affairs do, they strain to see the light of day and if you hide them they just pump iron in the shadows. So it was, when and only when this robust secret threatened at last to burst its own sub rosa roof beams, that they summoned young Wallis into the parlor on her birthday and bade her for once sit still, saying,
“Your mother and I have something to tell you.”
“Yes, it’s time you knew.”
“You being twelve now, and yes, of course, Happy Bat Mitzvah! It’s the twilight of your Wonder Bread years, whence destiny shall thrust you elbows and knees out into the great animal mystery. Destiny, that is, destiny and some happy probing hand, destiny will vault you so and before that happens, all fury and perfume, you do need to know….”
“How we met. Your father, he came in on a business trip. It took him through the High Holy Days so he ambled his way over to the nearest synagogue. After all, it was Yom Kippur, the very Day of Actual Atonement, and in between redundant repentant heartfelt sobbing liturgies we stood outside in the bright sunlit courtyard. I was there with my husband. You see, I was already married. I had an infant child too, nearly a toddler, but then I looked up and I saw HIM. It was fire, it was quicksilver, adamantine, it was a bolt of lightning, it was molten lava, it….”
“It was her laughter like childhood, like hard rain, the quick startle of her smile. Then she turned her head and met my gaze, the tender pulse of her throat was dancing all purity and danger. What a ripening young Goddess she was, her every gesture embodied such native grace! I was utterly mesmerized by the way she slowly unfolded. And I knew right then, I understood that all of the impossible dreams I’d ever cherished were about to come true. What a state of bliss it is to worship at the altar of the Ultimate Feminine! Such transcendent convulsive union, such quivering raw revelation, so intimate and….â€
“And I thought, O, but my poor baby!…but I did not look back. We lay together that very day. It was a riot for flesh, it was a field of flowers waking, it was a merging of two flames, it was preordained, it was even a bit kinky, and eight months and twenty-two days later, Wallis, you spilled into the world, bleating like a lamb …to slaughter, you clung to my breast, you hungered so, and I have never–do you understand?—I have never once felt ashamed!”
“L’amour, Wallis! L’amour! It is, in short, the only plot. The only sub-plot, the only why, the only wherefore, the only rhyme, the only raison d’être. It’s an epiphany of perfect communion, it’s the randy rutting beast in the backyard, it’s the only real Sanctum Sanctorum, it’s the Holy Grail discovered at a flea market, such sudden, unmistakable serendipity and irresistible raging delight! We ran away like giddy thieves in the night and have been duly devoted spouses ever since, although we never could get legally married, which wasn’t fair at all. O well, go fight City Hall! But you, Wallis, you are the product of such exquisite overwhelming love, lust, and passion! This is your inheritance, dear girl, on a cellular level, all this, and a small trust fund
too, so make of it what you will. It’s almost your turn to plumb the river, my dear, dear girl, my dearest darling…”
“Bastard. I’m a bastard!”
© 2010-2013 by Wallis Stern, excerpted from THE LOVE CHILDE WALLIS STERN: a Thinly Veiled Genre-Defying Faux Autobiographical Queer Bildungsroman.
FORTHCOMING PUBLICATION IN 2014 by UltraVioletPublishing at www.ultravioletlove.com
Wow you sure can write Wallis. Can’t wait to read further …
Brilliant!
Ah… how many of us would yearn to be the joyous product of such enflamed and sacred passion and white-lighted luminous independence (on Yom Kippur yet) and how few of us actually are – Wonderful language – and a great fun read from your subtitle to the end of the offered chapter. All my best … pearl…
Wallis Stern, YOU are TRULY am AMAZING WOMAN! <3 😉
We are left with the hardest words of all. “Bastard. I’m a bastard.” The parent’s story is told passionately, lovingly, with every bit of emotion it meant to them, but to Wallis, it boiled down to this: “Bastard”.
The secret, which she sensed was about to blow apart — on the day of atonement, at the time of her Bat Mitzvah, was poetry set to a secret. They loved each other very much, a love that somewhat excluded Wallis in the very nature of its secrecy, and they would continue to do so, the secret out.
But Wallis must live with the secret now. She was a Bastard. She must live with that. Her writing, her thinking, her relationships would ever be colored by that. A secret is never revealed; the burden of it is merely passed from one person to another.
Passionate and totally Brave Hearted. Wallis you are Loved.
Wallis is a writer to be cherished and a beautiful soul~
She writes from a different plane than most-she writes from her soul…<3
PS do not delete this comment like the others I have left here!!!! Thank you~
“L’amour, Wallis, L’amour. It is the only plot.” This blinding preface to Ms Stern’s novel is gobsmacking genius from A to Zed. Stern’s delicious layered imagistic writing proffers so tasty a treat for all the senses that one savours every morsel as the choicest of rare delicacies, laps ones bowl tidy unto gleaming & chivvies up to plead for more. Ms Sterns smashing cunning-linguistic prowess transforms her readers of a sudden into humbled beggared orphans queued up all longing for a wee taste of the transcendence our favourite new Bard consistently delivers. Tis the rarest of magics or alchemies one is privy to whilst reading Stern’s writing & Divinely inspired. On behalf of Art Attack & Auntie Beeb & all her fans across the pond I’m right chuffed up to extend our hearty congratulations to Wallis Stern on the publication of her book “The Love Child Wallis Stern.”
I love that your parents’ passion is matched by the urgency and fire of your telling of the tale–a real union of subject and style!!! Good work!!!
Every entry you write is so well worth reading… Thanks for all of them…
You did it again! another wonderful story! You are such an artist with words.
Wallis, what a beautifully moving story. I am SUCH A FAN of your work, your words, and the way you weave experience into poetry. I love your spirit and fire and your absolute commitment to contribute to the greater good. I love your words and the passion which emanates from them. Such a delight to sit in your world… If you shall be a bastard, then let it be the most beautiful, exquisite bastard known to man. ; ) (Personally, you are a gift!)
I’m stunned. OMG! Completely stunned. I’ve never read such a brilliant cascade of poetic images expressing TRUE LOVE at it’s most passionate and tender while also long lasting. Ms Stern really is a brilliant writer par excellence and I can’t wait til her book comes out. Thank you, Wallis Stern! For sharing your literary genius with the world and God bless you for donating the book’s first edition to charity! Your an ANGEL, Wallis Stern! A real LOVE CHILD IN EVERY WAY!
To the editor: I left a comment for this brilliant poem almost a month ago and it didn’t get printed. Please don’t lose this one like my first one?
This is poetic prose created by one electric mind. The beauty of the spaces that allow the reader to breathe in a moment of time, give birth to a beautiful bed of roses. “I am a bastard”. Wallis Stern rules!
What an amazing journey! Stern’s language is illuminating and poetic as we are drawn into a world of fragmented memory. I am touched by the powerful imagery and beauty of this excerpt. Stern is an innovative and brilliant writer. Bravo!.
Wallis Stern takes us to a place we haven’t been with enormous depth, humor, eloquence, reality. She takes a giant step in and a giant step back with her unique creative style, sensitivity
and wit. What a mind. What a world. What a talent!
Thank you.
it’s such a nice story. i wish i could share it with all of my facebook friends. but there isn’t a share button on it. 🙁 i just know that they will all love it too.
and … i’m a bisexual not a lesbian so i don’t even know if it’s ok that i read this magazine. 🙁