THE FIRST COMMANDMENT
This is not a romantic story
It is a biblical story
The Night Porter
The first commandment was simple: thou shalt not touch thyself.
It seemed quite simple at first. I lay in my bed naked and tried to become very little. Become a child again. I will say my prayers and then I will snuggle next to the cat, put one hand under the pillow and close my eyes. Sleep will come soon. My breathing will slow down and I will shut out all the noise, and the room and I will sink into darkness and the cat will go on purring and my feet will warm up. It was so cool under the sheet and I went on smiling and listening to my heart and feeling so safe now that I had His command. Was this love?
Then my hand found the wound between my legs. It was bleeding colorless blood, wet and slippery. I touched it and it burned. I opened the flesh flower with my hand and it smelled so nice under the sheet. It smelled of warm bread and it smelled of milk and it smelled of wet green grass and it smelled of the sea and then my other hand joined in the dance with all these smells of my life and we all started whirling around like crazy. My body fell into the wound of love. Was this love?
The commandment was clear: thou shalt not touch thyself. But then… that meant that my body was not mine. It did not belong to me anymore. So I pulled my hands away and held them by my side and I placed my body on a pedestal and worshipped it. It was forbidden, so I worshipped it. It was sacred, it could not be touched. I kept opening and closing my legs, opening and closing, without touching. I opened my legs for the last time and looked at the flesh folds and they were unfolding now, opening. Oh, it was a wound alright. But I did not touch myself. And the wound kept opening and spreading all over my body. Was this love?
I closed my legs and fell asleep. The body was forbidden. The body and I, we kept the first commandment and we became His.
Then came the second commandment.