More’s the Pity

by Daisy Friedman

During the last year of our marriage the bookshelves were cramped, overflowing.  Our books never truly commingled.  They cohabitated, but his criticism, theory and philosophy overpowered my poetry and fiction.  I pinpointed the problem; the shelves containing the M authors were the most congested.  My solution: I stopped buying books by Ms.

I thought this sacrifice might help.  I could reread the M books we had.  We split up anyway and now there’s a lot More bookshelf space and a lot More freedom.  From Mann to Mayakovsky, McCarthy, McEwan, Melville, Merrill, Miller, Milne, Moore, Moore, and More.  Through Muldoon, Munro, and Musil, not excluding Molière, Morrison, or Murdoch and must not forget Mallarmé, Malraux, or Marx.

So many M authors, like listing lovers, dinner companions, bedfellows, bridge partners, date nights just the author and me.  Dewey Decimal system, arranged alphabetically, catalogued chronologically.  I neglected Archibald MacLeish — an oversight, one overnight — and where my Ms begin a man of passion, but just a one-night-stand.  Oh, and yes, please, let me count Melville though I still have not finished “Moby Dick.”  Why not admit it?  M is my favorite like Vladimir’s L.  M is so shapely, so sexy, so sharp when capitalized, so curvy when lowercase.  M admires himself.  M is the narcissist, falling in love with W and even seeing himself in V and vaguely in N.  Competitive with W — M’s fraternal twin.

Ms filling vacations and propped up in bed with me just before turning out the light.  Too many Ms to remember —  the More the Merrier, but More’s the Pity.  I’m partial to the Less of Mies and the More of Oliver Twist, somewhere between a fress and starvation.  The shelves were swarming, buckling.  I had to do something to make room for myself.
 

Daisy Friedman is a writer and native Manhattanite.  Her work has appeared in The Paris Review, Provincetown Arts, Bomb, Mudfish, and other magazines.  She is working on a novel she hopes to complete soon.