An Open Letter to Anata'alie
or
Rahman, Brigitte Arlette
Who She Is
and
Why Her Mystery Matters
Dear Brigitte,
Until now, we have corresponded in notes across the Internet, sporadically, politely, dispassionately. With all the miles, and detachment, and the silences intervening, your mystery survives intact. So, that is how I will address you, because that is how I know you -- in a note on the Internet -- with deepest respect, from one creative to another.
You have challenged us,
as writers, to guess at who
you are. From the tidbits,
and teasers, and crumbs of
information that you dropped
along the way, you challenged
us: spin light from naught;
spin from thinnest imagination
a glittering yarn from riddles,
and somehow see the tapestry
in the wispy silk and shadows
of your cobwebby secrets.
You want a sorcerer, Brigitte, a master of spells (and spelling), to paint and reveal and portray you. You want magic and we are mortals. All we can is write. We strive, we aspire, we try with our ribbons of words to sheathe and wrap and display you: and do we enfold you, then embrace you and give your mystery form.
Of course, you will defy our attempts to define you, but you have dared us, and we are writers, and we are willing to try. So, although we may never uncover you, or probe the depths of your secret, if we are skillful in the weaving of our words and the delicacy of our ribbons, we may guess at the feel of your beauty, glimpse the mystery, and see the shape of you beneath.
My first guess--that you were born to privilege; that you were bred from loins of power and of an ancient matriarchal guild. You have inherited their traditions, and their designs, and the dreams of your Mothers direct you. Uncounted generations of hope and delayed ambitions have waited for a daughter, their promised one, to secure their place in time. And you ~ are you that star, the worthy heir of Scheherazade and Eve?
You possess all the elements in abundance: the beauty, the perseverance, a focused mind, a great heart, a large and original talent, the curiosity, bewildering complexity, a world consuming energy...and the Ambition.
You have, indeed, been burdened with potential; you have been a diligent and successful student; and your history has trained you well...but you are young. You have yet to grow into the role that may be asked of you on the globe's world-stage. (To get there, to accomplish that, you will need to stand for something and be attacked for it). For all of your achievements, you are still the youth of the woman you will become. You are most impressive, and if you don't self-destruct, you may impact, even change and help redirect the future.
Perhaps because you have a strong sense of your own destiny, you can be arrogant and dismissive of the needs of others. Now that you are done with frivolous fun and the perils of feral youth, you are frustrated by delays, impatient with distractions, and derisive of thoughtless fools.
Another guess (wild lunge in the dark), but I think that when you are not center stage, or in the eye of a camera, that the company of others can be tedious, wearying, and worse, insufferably unproductive. You ache for humanity and the plight of mankind breaks your heart, but you have little room for people individually. Again (not surprisingly), you have chosen well for yourself. If one person is an intrusion, still, as a breathing legend and focus of mystery, you can touch the masses, and be intimate, and heal with the hearts of many.
From your writings, it seems that you have known love, that it wasn't enough, that you turned and walked away. I am at a loss and cannot decide whether it is
because you are
high maintenance,
or like a phantom,
keep a distance
and weigh nearly
next-to-nothing
on the scales of
love and touch
and romance.
You are restless:
intellectually and
creatively. Endlessly
so. You do not sleep
well. Expectations
have been passed
down to you and you
have accepted them.
You are impatient; the greater world seems oblivious to your rising; and heedless, time strides on relentlessly. (Not-for-long: another guess.)
12 December & 15 July...mentioned in a story, and a poem respectively. One is certainly your birth date, but what of the other? Also, I may stumble here and stray where I do not belong, but I would guess that you stand about 5' 10"; that your strength, though immense, is brittle; that your laughter would melt the stars; and most confounding, that your eyes don't show a thing.
Only face to face would tell the story, but your eyes take in and give nothing away. No light shines back, nothing is mirrored, no expression, nothing of consequence escapes from your eyes. This is killing, the distressing part of your mystery...but that is what your pictures say.
You write repeatedly of not needing others, of not caring a fig for what we think. Undoubtedly true, I'm sure, and yet I think she (you) "doth protest too much". Like 'freedom' and 'love', the more people carry on about it, and the more it concerns them (you may be sure), the less they have of it. People comfortable with their independence don't fret about it constantly. Maybe the joys of solitary independence are wearing a bit thin. It must be fatiguing to be alone and Brigitte-against-the-world.
You hold a great store of anger in reserve. You boil with dark and dangerous passions that I think even you fear to see released. You are combative, a fighter, perhaps even a warrior such as the ancients would revere.
You have built a wall around yourself (and this may be a good thing as it prevents havoc in the body public generally, and in the male population specifically). I cannot speak to your motives, but the one question I would ask, "Who hurt you?" would be refused and returned unanswered.
You requested that your beauty not be a subject of our conversation, and I will honor that. I have looked hard, yes, and I have peered closely to pull your image out of a graphic and been richly rewarded, though I am bound not to say it. I have seen you posed long-stemmed and exotic, majestic, wary as sacred Ibis poised between earth and flight, and cannot speak of it. And the beauty, ever changing, always different, mon Dieu...the variety...the exquisite faces! But words are on strike, and so beauty divorced from meaning.
Yes, Bridge, I will honor your request, but under protest. What you have asked of me is patently unfair; it is most unsound reasoning, myopic, and as mean as it is creatively bankrupt. It is just so wrong for the observer (as recording artist), to witness Something, to encounter such rare cause to rhapsodize, and then be prevented from doing it. You are a writer, Brigitte, you should know better.
Or, perhaps you are right. Perhaps you are wise to center on other than beauty. Your other talents are more sustaining and will improve and become more important over time. (Though I think, in truth, you will be a beauty all your life.) Yes, somehow, I'm sure it is a good thing that you are being modest and coyly correct; and so, though even now I repent my silence, I will comply and obey your harsh request.
Umm...your future is the problem. You are too much taken with death. In virtually all of your stories, you seem destined, indeed, well nigh eager for the role of martyr. The dilemma is: once you find your mate, your martyr's cause (your reason to live becomes reason to die), then death ceases to be attractive. That's the irony of a martyr's end. It is only when life takes on meaning that death can make a statement. But I think this issue will fade for you as you mature, as you experience, and endure, and grow more sure of yourself.
Your mystery? Well, your mystery may be contrived and a bold manufacture, but it is powerful, and it is undeniable, and as vital to a writer as canvas to a painter. We write to sculpt the void, you see, entwine, then tune it to the stars. We paper it with questions, and randomly drape it with guesses until, lucky, we land some, and finally, faintly see the outlines; then limn and render and fathom shapes as truth and destiny. Because, unlike beauty, we never actually see truth (or destiny, for that matter), but they are real, with substance, and we are born with a sense of both.
Give a writer the unknown and he will have his purpose. And you, like a high-strung, hunting cat with a tail that weaves and twitches, you bring back obscuriosities (vexatious, irksome things), and tales that entice, and slap awake, and haunt of mystery. A missing page, a vacant stage, a blank piece of paper; you are muse, Erato, the voice behind the echo that a writer strives to hear.
And your mystery is twice compounded...how you conjured, woman, and how conjoined to be creator and inspiring muse as well. To be sure, you muse for others, but you are a compelling artist, also, with a providence of poems. This is double magic and I am curious; can you muse yourself, Brigitte, or only tickled by another?
I'm glad you are writing again. I enjoy your familiar work, rereading and looking for clues, but I am looking forward to new revelations and expressions of Self...as I do one of your whirlwind visits, one of your intermittent bouts of email, where you read, and write, and send, and drop in and out of the ether.
I like surprises, and I'm looking
for your new work to feed my
fascination and my expectations
to explore. No secret there.
I've always liked your work.
I like the puzzle pieces
scattered everywhere; I like the
adventure of finding something
deep and rare to discover...and
temptations abound! Images
ravish the eye, they tease the
tongue; words fill the mouth and
yours are delicious. Yes, your
talent is raw and undisciplined
(we've had that conversation),
but there are passages and moments of surpassing beauty in your work.
Give me more.
You are amazing, woman, the truest sort of mystery woman, and if you have eluded me entirely (as I suspect), and this vision is not you, then (and I need not remind you), be yourself. Above all else, be yourself. As a writer, you pen with unique promise; yours is a distinctive voice and irreplaceable. So be warned, you are destroyed do you mold yourself on, or rebel against this tired, and pale, and underfed description. You are the last person that needs telling, but do not be dissuaded from being who you are.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
So, fair Anata'alie, it seems I have failed. I had intended a short, classic portrayal, something simple and direct. I wanted an elegant capture of your essence, with no wandering or diverting, no straying from purpose and no elaboration. But in writing about you, I had forgotten about you...that you are larger-than-life and do not submit to confinement in smaller packages. So, if this is overlong, it could have been longer, with no clear resolution, and even less understanding. Be grateful I showed restraint.
