In the moon that is always rising. "Wheresoever she was, *there* was Eden." Mark Twain wrote that. I always thought it sounded cool. The ultimate compliment in six words. So unexpected in context, so complete in sincerity, so simple in expression. But I never knew what those words really meant until Kate taught me. A friend of mine from the German department introduced us at a party he hosted. As parties go, that one was pretty restrained. No loud music. No dancing. No kegs. Just the soft sounds of a stereo and lots of conversation. Kate was a first-year graduate student in English; I was a second-year in math. Since I skipped the sixth grade and completed college in three years, it turned out Kate was actually a few months older than me. We enjoyed many of the same activities. We both loved to paint and cook. (She was much better at both though.) She liked classical music too but wasn't the opera fiend I am. We did share a common passion for literature -- the gift of language -- and that's what we talked about when we hit it off. Who would have thought staying awake when my undergrad Russian Civ. class discussed WAR AND PEACE would help me meet the girl of my dreams? Anyway, after that party we cooked a couple of meals for each other and hung out on the weekends. I took her to see the symphony play some Tschaikovsky; she even agreed to make the five hour drive down to the Met to see LA CENERENTOLA with me. I usually take relationships slowly. Yeah, I did kiss her after our first real date, but it was a while before we got into bed. It finally happened about a month after we began seeing each other. We ate dinner at our favorite Chinese restaurant and frittered most of the evening away talking. Conversations with Kate tend to be manic affairs -- she confided that hardly anyone besides her parents and her younger brother could keep up -- but apparently we were a match. We traded stories from our lost youth and filled each other in on the latest books we'd read. (Kate's was THE GRAPES OF WRATH for the second time that year; if you discount number theory textbooks, mine was THE LAND OF LAUGHS.) We discussed the singular habits of a small band of renegade geese that refused to migrate south with the others and contentedly remained at the lake waking half of campus up at daybreak even as cool October turned into cold November and the days grew ever shorter. After pondering the peculiar behavior of cola when salt is generously heaped into it, we swapped fairy tales. I told her the sad history of the Ring of the Nibelungs, and she spoke of the Butterfly Dream of Chuang-Tzu. Together, we wondered about Merlyn, frozen in wood by a sorceress' spell, and prophesied his liberation by the king who would one day return. We could easily have kept at it all night, feeding off each other's voices, but the attentions of the proprietor and her staff made it clear that we should depart. Stepping outside into the only slightly chilly autumn air, we headed downhill the half-mile towards Kate's apartment. The afternoon had been one of the loveliest of the season -- Indian summer came late to the Northeast that year -- and the evening was, if anything, even more splendid. Although it was but ten o'clock on a Saturday night, somehow an inexplicable quiet surrounded us. Hardly anyone walked about; the traffic was subdued, almost non-existent. The footlights in front of the campus buildings lent the columned facades an otherworldly aura. Indeed, it was a magical night, the kind of eve when faeries mingle and dance with mortals under the naked oak trees; when nature and the heavens conspire to sculpt and present to us a perfect hour, a gift so that we may remember and, in remembering, preserve beauty if only as a memory; when a man and a woman would declare their love to each other, their longing and affection and desire witnessed solely by the earth below and the black velvet sky festooned with jewel-like stars and the harvest moon above. It was a night for lunatics and lovers and poets, a night for Kate and me. Glancing up above the church steeple about a block ahead, I quoted, "The moon shines bright: in such a night as this, when the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees and they did make no noise, in such a night Troilus methinks mounted the Troyan walls and sigh'd his soul toward the Grecian tents, where Cressid lay that night." To my surprise, she continued where I'd left off. "In such a night did Thisbe fearfully o'ertrip the dew and saw the lion's shadow ere himself and ran dismay'd away." "In such a night stood Dido with a willow in her hand upon the wild sea banks and waft her love to come again to Carthage." "In such a night Medea gather'd the enchanted herbs that did renew old Aeson." With exaggerated gestures I went on: "In such a night did Jessica steal from the wealthy Jew and with an unthrift love did run from Venice as far as Belmont." "In such a night did young Lorenzo swear he loved her well, stealing her soul with many vows of faith and ne'er a true one." "In such a night did pretty Jessica, like a little shrew, slander her love, and he forgave it her," I finished, delighting in the rich cadence of the words and dissolving in a fit of gentle mirth. Kate wore this huge smile on her face. "I didn't know you knew Shakespeare so well," said she, grasping my hand. "Just the good parts," said I. We continued quietly through certain half-deserted streets. I felt uneasy though. I knew what I wanted to say, but I wondered if this was the right time. "Screw your courage to the sticking-place. Tell her. Ask her," a small voice in my head encouraged. "Fair Jessica, did we just announce that we're falling in love or am I imagining it?" I inquired, in a quavering voice. Enveloped by a new silence even less amiable than the last, we approached the next street. The music of the spheres dimmed. The wind died down. The trees stopped swaying, their branches hanging solemnly in the mute air like my unanswered question. It was as though God finally reached five hundred quadrillion Mississippi and paused for a breath. In that interminable interval between one tick and the next, a single question hammered away, relentless in its urgency: "Did I just say the wrong thing?" "Gentle Lorenzo, if you're dreaming, then so am I," she responded, tightening her grip on my hand -- and my heart -- with her words. "Then we are such stuff as dreams are made on," I said, in my best Bogart voice which, unfortunately, was a truly pathetic imitation. But, nonetheless, the future opened out pregnant with possibility. We waited at the curb while traffic whizzed by. I stared into her eyes. She stared into mine. Our lips met. My arms wrapped around Kate's back and pulled her close. Her hands leapt up to my face. We held the kiss. A car horn broke the connection. We clasped each other's fingers and crossed the now still street. I brought her hand up to my lips and gave it a quick peck. Another silence. This time, it satisfied. We reached her apartment building, bounded up two flights of stairs with an alacrity of spirit, and entered her humble abode. I sat on the old, dilapidated couch in her tiny living room. She opened the fridge, grabbed a couple of beers, and handed me one. "Wait here a minute," she said before disappearing into the adjoining bathroom. "I'll put some music on," I told the rustling and banging that was Kate closeted behind the bathroom door. I rummaged through her disorganized CD collection, found what I was looking for, and put a Beethoven disc in Kate's little stereo. I heard a flush. She tirled at the pin and returned as the Hand of Fate started knocking on our door. If music be the food of love, play on; give me excess of it. ***** I. Allegro con brio. --------------------- Kate sits down next to me on the sofa. I drape my left arm around her shoulder and hold her. For a moment, there we sit and let the sounds of music creep into our ears. I turn around to look at her. Backlit by moonlight streaming in through the window, her face achieves an ethereal glow. She's as divine as a Raphael Madonna. A bird squawks outside. Is it a nightingale or a lark? Or a goose? Does it matter? My face sinks the two inches to meet hers. Our lips brush against each other's for an instant; my tongue darts out to wet them. I pull her lower lip into my mouth and suck on it briefly and lift my hands up to her cheeks to frame her face. Fingers splayed, I gently push her back into the couch. Our heads rotate in opposite directions and veer together until noses rub. My tongue parts her lips and pounds against her teeth while Beethoven's fate motif resounds through the room. My hands finger the unbuttoned top of her blouse. The gate opens. My tongue snakes inside to joust with hers. Kate's hands grip the back of my neck pulling me in still closer. My hands caress her back. The kiss is a moment arrested in eternity. I move her hair behind her ears. My lips tickle her nose, her cheeks jostle against mine, the metal frames of our glasses clank. We remove them, and she climbs atop my lap. I tilt her head back to taste her neck. Looking down her shirt, I see the top of her bra. My hands yank the shirt out of her skirt, then slip beneath to fly along her spine. On the third clumsy attempt, I succeed in unclasping the bra. She slides her fingers down the blouse and lifts it out. Through the cotton, I observe the outline of her hardening tits. Her arms out of the way, I stare longingly at the tops of her breasts. My hands extricate themselves from under her blouse and reappear in front to fondle her chest through the fabric. Kate jumps a little when my palms cover her and slowly flows into me, moaning her approval as I tweak her nipples. Her fingers unbutton my shirt. As she exposes my chest, her lips press against skin. When she finishes, I wrestle the shirt off and chuck it across the room. My turn. Fingers trace the contour of her collarbone and descend down her chest into the exposed cleavage. Unfastening the third button of her white blouse lets me slide it off her shoulders. Undoing the fourth completely reveals her bare breasts. I gaze at them with awe and wonder and respect and adoration and slowly glide my hands across their curves. I force myself to surrender perfection and make brisk work of the remaining buttons. Bending my head to greet her chest properly, I kiss her clavicle and leisurely travel downwards. Teeth playfully gnaw at the skin immediately above her breasts. The rest of my mouth demands a piece of the action and soon takes over. As I tongue her tits, the areolae stiffen. Small pink mountains burst out of a sea of skin. I nibble on her erect nipples the way a small rabbit might begin a meal. Her hands push my head into her chest, holding them there, spurring me on. The solitary sea subsumes me. Reverting to the instincts of infancy, I just suckle. Eventually, my hands race across her inner thigh. She spreads her legs a little to admit my fingers into the cave of her skirt. Is this the Allegory of Love? (I couldn't see either Folly or Time, but I don't doubt Venus and Cupid were both there with us.) Kate kicks off her sandals and lifts up her ass. I relieve her of her purple panties and bring them up to my face. Sniffing deeply, I revel in their musky odor. Tossing her underwear to the floor, our lips meet once more. This time her tongue worms its way into my mouth, and the combat begins anew. ***** II. Andante con moto. ---------------------- Yearning like a god in pain, my erection strains uncomfortably into denim. Kate must have felt its throbbing moments before because her hands undo my belt buckle and unbutton my pants. She slides off me, and I get up and kick off my shoes and hop around comically trying to disentangle my feet from my jeans and boxers. The air is cold, but my cock stands perfectly rigid. Kate gives it a friendly glance. Meeting my eyes, she kneels before me, toppling the unopened and by now forgotten bottles of Pete's Wicked. Her warm hands massage my balls. I groan in ecstasy. She dives between my legs, surfaces beneath my scrotum, and, taking each sac into her hot mouth, sucks my balls clean. Kate coos and runs her lips along the bottom of my shaft from its base up to the head. She strokes my length and stabs her tongue at the single cloudy tear dripping off the eye of my little cyclops. Then, she grazes the head of my dick; covering just its tip with her mouth, barely raking it with her teeth, the bottom of her tongue presses against it. Her lips encircle the annular indentation whence the foreskin once emerged. I clench my jaw in pleasure. My hands course through her hair as Kate releases the head and blows across it. Her fingers pull my skin tight at the base of the shaft. At first, she only takes the tip back in, bathing it in saliva. Kate inaugurates a bobbing motion. Her strokes are deliberate, each enveloping a little more of the shaft. The head never leaves her mouth; she licks it on every pass. Ere long, my entire cock vanishes into her, only to reappear and vanish again. Her hands clutch my butt. I know my geyser will soon erupt. To delay the inevitable climax, I mentally recite the first twenty digits of pi over and over again. It works, and the suspense is perilously sustained. Kate starts to rotate her mouth as she fucks me with her face. Her tongue slides along the bottom of my cylinder on every stroke. I can't contain myself any longer. I tell her I'm coming. A finger slips into my anus. I explode. She stops sucking and holds the bulging head of my dick in her mouth. An avalanche of cum tears down my mountain and buries her tongue in mounds of melting snow. A feasting presence so full of light, she accepts my gift. ***** III. Allegro. -------------- Gazing into her cherubic face, as beautiful and innocent as a vision in a dream, I help Kate to her feet. I thank her. Then I kiss her, my tongue exploring the mouth I just shot into. I notice a few stray drops of whiteness upon her chin and lick the dribble off, sharing it with her. I slide her blouse off and push her back down onto the sofa. My hand sprints down her chest to greet her waist. She sucks in a deep breath, and I unbutton her skirt. Sliding it off her legs, I stare at her body in its full splendor for the first time. Even Helen was but a shadow compared to this. "You're beautiful," I remark, tremulously. It's the truth, but the words are inadequate. I worship her like an acolyte reveres his master. Setting off on my pilgrimage by taking her toes into my mouth, I lift her legs up and lick the hollow behind her knees. My hands exalt in the smoothness of her skin. Methodically working towards the altar of the goddess, virtuoso lips kiss first one, then the other calf. Like a giant bird opening its wings, Kate parts her thighs. When I finally reach the temple, my fingers loop through her pubic hair. Pressing my hands against her slit, I shove a pair of fingers into her moist cunt, sliding them in and out to simulate fucking. Kate's sighs are the music of Orpheus, the apotheosis of sound. Eager lips usurp the fingers' ministrations. My tongue thrusts out, and the snake enters the Garden. It explores her pussy, teasing her. It penetrates her cunt, coaxing an endless string of soft and blissful moans. The tongue ultimately attacks her clit. Licking it. Sucking it. Leaving her gasping for breath. Rasping in desire. Shuddering in delight. The rising ocean crashes against crumbling dikes. The dams collapse. A searing paroxysm shatters the flood-gates and bathes her pulsating femininity in a torrent of warm ambrosia. Ecstasy fuses with the orgiastic music of thunder and dissolves in a tender embrace. ***** IV. Allegro. ------------- I stand up and kiss her, letting her taste of herself while I taste of myself. The nectar of the gods couldn't be as sweet. We migrate to her bedroom and fall onto her bed. Separated by a wall, Beethoven sounds thinner and less expansive but paradoxically more immediate and human as well. Our hands scamper across each other's bodies. I return to her breasts and lick and kiss and nip at them like a condemned man savoring a final meal. My tongue dashes down her front and gets sucked into her navel the way a whirlpool or a black hole devours everything which gets in its way. I lie down on her and cover her neck with my mouth, watching goose-bumps rise on her skin. My dick, even harder than it was when she blew me, rests right below her crack. Her legs spread, inviting me to enter. 'Tis a consummation devoutly to be wish'd. "Should I go find a condom, Kate?" I ask, praying her response is negative. Someone on Olympus smiles on me as she shakes her head. "Fuck me," she says desperately. "Just fuck me. I need you now." I gladly oblige. The bow is drawn. The shaft flies true. With a sudden thrust, my tongue disappears into her mouth just as my dick is swallowed by her slit. Her cunt muscles respond to the intrusion by squeezing my member. Shifting my weight to my elbows, I initiate a frantic pumping and then gradually slow my strokes down. Kate lifts her butt off the bed allowing me to plunge still deeper. I commence a circular motion that Kate matches. Initially, our movements are relaxed but swiftly become more violent and less controlled. When I sense Kate's spasm approaching, I stop twisting and lift myself out of her. Ignoring her moans of protest and resisting her efforts to pull me back in, I rub the tip of my cock against her labia and circumscribe her clitoris with a thumb and forefinger. I know that by keeping her excruciatingly poised on the precipice of orgasm I'm only delaying my own release, but I also know that easing off now will make the climax that much stronger when it arrives. I'm not sure she agrees because her nails dig into the sensitive skin right below my armpits. Biting into her shoulders, I give her what she wants, placing the knob back inside to emphatic sighs of welcome. With leisurely strokes, I burrow my length home. Like a python, Kate's pussy constricts about my cock. I enter into a rhythm, alternating slow strokes with fast ones, and after a minute abandon the slow ones altogether. Over the plaintive wails of the bedsprings, I hear her mantra: "Harder. Harder. Harder." Language is only rarely so eloquent. Kate's fingers sink into my back while I drive in and out of her cunt. Her legs wrap around my ass. Heightening our frenzy, her body shoves back in time with my thrusts. Suddenly, the walls of her vagina convulse around me. She arches her back. A primal scream echoes in my ears, and Kate thrashes furiously underneath. Her thighs hold me in a vise-like grip. I stop fighting my orgasm. A shudder, a tremor, and a heroic palpitation. Then a whimper, a trembling, and a final quiver. Six spurts of sperm fly into her drenched cleft. We die the little death and are resurrected to die again. I pull out of her and rub my cum-covered dick against her clit. It takes but a few moments: She gasps. The rill sings its liquid notes and fades melodiously away. *****