I knew a man once whose grandfathers were preachersand whose sister was a beauty queen.He lives in Nebraska, and because of himI’ve stayed out of Nebraska for sixteen years.I thought the feeling might be there, and if I found it again—what marrows were sacrificed to it,as one offers the innermost parts to the gods!And what more would we have burned.Then I saw him in Georgia, at a conference for writers.We even touched—a forearm on a shoulder,a wrist across a back, like skeletons embracing.The feeling wasn’t in my body.Nor was it in his body or in the space between us.I was surprised, for I’d thought it might be,and I’d thought maybe I wanted it back.It was just that I’d never seen anything like it,what it made him do to his wife.(It had been the first time for us both.)Last night, I dreamt it was the last day of my life,and I was allowed one favor.When I asked it, the wife, that dark angel of generosity, said Yes.I was so grateful, I didn't touch him.I just lay there in the ecstasy of what was about to happen.In the morning he placed his arm across me very slowlyand I knew, finally, that what had lasted in memory wasn't him,or what our bodies did, or what they would have done.It was a firstness that I thought I'd never find again—the firstness of it,which in the dream comes just before the firstness of death.