How I met my mistress (i)
I was a young gentleman about town. My hair had gone white prematurely. I bound it in a snowy queue, artlessly tied with a gray velvet ribbon so that the large, riotous curls would not detract from my "speaking eyes." I had just ended my affair with a young barrister who desired me to have a court wig made for him from my locks as an early birthday present and a proof of my affections. I left his flat the next day and thereafter the country, unshorn, having carved the appropriate quotation from Samson Agonistes into the table with the ebony swordcane I had received upon reaching my majority.

We met in Baltimore, thea mea, I in my customary habit (slim charcoal suit and wingtips--a waistcoat the color of claret), you in an ill-fitting frock, mermaid-hued, shod with clumsy brown workboots. Your face was a darkling poem. You had no hair. I longed to solve the cinnabar puzzles of your ears! Large copper headphones hid them from view. You were listening to a podcast about sustainable rooftop gardening and clutching the rail of the escalator with desperation. I inquired after your health with some concern. Perhaps you were experiencing vertigo? You could not hear me, of course. I mimed "vertigo" with one arm. You thought I meant "genetically modified watercress." You turned from me with disdain. We rode to the third floor in silence. I watched your neck twist almost imperceptibly starboard. Even standing on level ground, you were taller than I. My copy of Wittgenstein's letters fell from my nerveless fingers. You whipped around at the thud and stared at the book on the tiles as if it had been the author of your discontents revealed to you at last...