Princess Papan

"What was her name? Do you remember it?" asked Papan.
"I don't remember well, and in fact I know nothing, absolutely nothing at all, about the women I have loved."
"That simply means you have never loved," answered Papan. "You simply have no idea of love as an absolute concept. Loving is knowing. It is also like a crime since it involves death, burial, and resurrection. For how otherwise can one possess the body of a woman? One cannot penetrate the walled city without first subduing its inhabitants. Thus, love is something that is very serious. Today it is completely forgotten, but once, in the city of Nandur it was known and understood. It involves Three-Eyed One and the Green God, and also the year of Orur. The tiger lilies grow in silence on the white mountain peaks. Love in fact is a strange and secret chemistry, in which the androgynous is born. This is true and complete love; everything else is different. Have you ever noticed how impossible it was to fuse yourself with the person you thought you loved, even though sleeping in the same bed? There is always something separating you, a thread of air, a different dream. Can the lovers be truly united if each one dreams a different dream? If you ever begin to dream the same dreams as your love, then you will be able to create the new star, the star of Him-Her."

"Strangely, or perhaps through this suggestion, I began to have the same dreams as Papan, and to share her visions. Thus when I came into her room I no longer spoke, but sat down in a wicker chair beside the window, and silently allowed her visions to pour over me, certain that hers and mine were the same, while all the time she looked through me as though I were a window."