Portrait 14

My dear boy,

We had this talk the other day. You had already turned into a frog, I had not noticed, and I had no idea you had never been a prince anyway. So I said,

You know, in addition to loving you, I am also in love with you. And also, I am, in my apparent meekness, strong enough to know and to speak the truth, in full cognizance of the devastating consequences. Because, my dear boy, when you are my age and you have been through a lot of rejections, and a lot of deception, and an awful lot of sheer balllessness, and meaninglessness, and ersatz, you have to take full responsibility and you have to fight. Even if it means risking everything that appears to be holding your life together - when in fact all it does is create the illusion of survival.

And then you turned into a frog: a ballless, meaningless frog in a quagmire of ersatz.

And you still have not wiped that retarded, self-important smirk off your reptilian face; and why should you - after all, I still write for you and I still write to you.

Iris