“Soon I’ll Be Loving You Again” has been a fixture in my rotation for the past few weeks. There’s a quiet moment near the end of the song, as the music is beginning to fade, when Marvin sings, “Oh, Janis”. Marvin’s calling out of his beloved’s name is a wounded moan, as if he is completely at the mercy of his longing.
I Want You is, of course, the ultimate art-object on unabashed desire. There is a shamelessness in the public expression of desire for someone. There’s a boldness, and a special boldness in committing that expression to artistic form. In confessing your love to the archive, you’ve either got to be so certain of its indelibility, or willingly accepting of the possibility that it isn’t forever, accepting full-on the bittersweetness of its record should the relationship end. Personally (and prudishly), I think Marvin Gaye told us too much of his business in general. But equally, I am romanced by confessions so public and permanent.
Several of the poems in my manuscript (in the vault, don’t ask) are dedicated to [Redacted]. These dedications have shifted from his initials to full name, to being deleted, and back. I vacillate between an anxiety about marking a time in my life with a specific person so boldly on the page, and being thrilled by the ultimate, permanent hard launch. At times, it feels like a flash mob proposal. Even choosing not to name him here, withholding his name, feels at once like secrecy and an ostentatious asking to be asked: who is it? I’m incapable of moving silently and yet I’m strangely cagey. But to name is in part to summon, to draw close, and that’s all I ever want.
The named ode negotiates the false chasm between public and private. It’s a whisper in a clandestine moment and a guttural, irrepressible utterance in the street. There are times when calling out a name in a song or a poem is no different than calling it out in the dark. Anyplace, there’s really no one there but the two of us.