Polyamory

by Michael Greenberg

An acquaintance called Barbara Foster phones to invite me to the monthly meeting of her "polyamory group" in Greenwich Village. "We believe in multiple love relationships", she explains. "An extended family where everything's above board - you're fully aware of your partner's lovers, and he knows all about yours. No cheating, no broken trust, which, as you know, is what causes love to crumble."
I pull The Kreutzer Sonata from my shelf, Tolstoy's diatribe against sex, to read on the subway ride downtown. The narrator Pozdnyshev mocks the notion that "spiritual affinity" is the basis of marriage. "Is it because of unity of ideals that people go to bed together?", he asks sarcastically. He can't bear the fact that, duped by sexual attraction, he convinced himself he had fallen in love. When attraction ends, contempt takes over, lasting until the couple's last miserable breath. Yet we "go to the grave believing we have lived perfectly normal and happy lives!", cries Pozdnyshev. To protect the "purity" of ideal love, Pozdnyshev proposes chastity in marriage.
The meeting is to take place at the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center, a former elementary school on West 13th Street, filled with concealed staircases and unexpected wings. "We're just renting space here", a polyamorist hastens to inform me. "For the most part, they're completely confused about who we are." About forty people have gathered in a room tucked away in a remote corner of the third floor. An air-conditioner rattles loudly.
Strips of black duct tape keep the carpet from coming apart. Our chairs are arranged in a circle, like in nursery school.
I find Barbara, who hands me a book she co-wrote, entitled Three in Love:
Menages a trois from ancient to modern times. The other authors are her husband and the third member of their menage. "I lived it", she says with disarming intensity.
Among the threesomes she profiles are Joseph and Magda Goebbels and Lida Baarova; Charles Parnell and Kitty and Willy O'Shea; Jack Kerouac and Neal and Carolyn Cassady; and Superman, Clark Kent and Lois Lane.
It occurs to me that the characters in The Kreutzer Sonata also make up a menage a trois.When Pozdnyshev beholds his wife playing duets with his rival, he is captivated by "her fascinating, abhorrent face . . . her perfectly melting mood, her tenderly pathetic and blissful smile". Pozdnyshev is excited by the music as well. "In consequence of my jealousy, there passed between them a kind of electric current." To deny his rival the satisfaction of knowing how threatened he feels, Pozdnyshev invites him to come and play again with his wife. "I was aware that I could not control that body of hers." Out of his mind with jealousy, he murders her with a curved Damascus dagger.
At 8 o'clock sharp, the featured speaker bursts into the room. She is Nan Wise, Certified Relationship and Alternative Lovestyles Specialist, and Happiness Coach.
Tall, voluptuous, with long coppery hair, she looks as if she has stepped out of the pages of a Robert Crumb cartoon. To complete the picture, she has brought along her lover, or her "secondary relationship", as the polyamorists would call him. Her husband couldn't make it but, she assures us, "he's poly, too".
"Languaging is of critical importance", Nan says. We are immediately bombarded with made-up words, apparently meant to lend a sociological aura to the movement. A heavy-set man wants to know how to present his poly- amorous desire to his monogamous girlfriend. "The dreaded poly/mono dilemma!", Nan cries. "To lead this life successfully, you need advanced skill-sets. They can be learned.
But they require commitment. Sacrifice, in some cases. Maturity. Work."
The couple sitting next to me clutch each other's hands, like nervous passengers on a plane.
The polyamorist's ultimate goal is to reach the state of "compersion", where jealousy is transcended and "one finds pleasure in the pleasure of his lover with another" -a variation, perhaps, of Pozdnyshev's ideal love. The ability to negotiate is paramount.
"Advance-skill polys can cut a relationship deal in three to five minutes", Nan says. The guidelines are simple: "win/win or no deal".
Someone complains about the word "compromise", with its "negative connotations of giving something up". All agree that "collaborate" should replace it as the favoured term. A man reports that, after they went poly, his wife of twenty years left him. He seems morose and stung, but sympathy for his plight is measured. He has failed to reach compersion. However, more bruised feelings from members of the audience come to light. A young woman worries about maintaining primary status with her main lover. "I don't want to be demoted to number two or three." Another complains of being stuck at a low rung on the ladder. "I feel like a mistress. I mean, what the hell am I doing this for?" Maybe a change of language would ease her discomfort. "'Primary' could be 'principal', and the rest could be called 'satellites'", suggests a man. "It's less hierarchal."
Wise's secondary pipes up with advice of his own: "Life is fluid and love even more so. Today's secondary may move to the top, while the primary may be struck off the list entirely". He glances at Nan, who ignores him. As the meeting breaks up, a "cuddle party" is announced for next week -"for people who want more touch in their lives without it leading to sex or rejection".
An outspoken member of the group, Birgitte, invites a few friends to her apartment across the street, and she allows me to tag along. As she unlocks the door, two eager identical miniature dogs greet her, and Birgitte, large-bodied and with a queenly demeanour, scoops them up in her arms.
The apartment is stacked with her Michel Basquiat-inspired paintings. Each canvas has its title scrawled across the top. "She was his flavor of the month", reads one. "He fucked her brains out", goes another. In her day job, Birgitte works as a make-up artist. "I did Condoleezza Rice for a television appearance", she tells me. Propped against the wall I spot a large canvas, called "He's her twin". A woman and a man are holding hands. Each has a real dagger sticking out of his large, papier mache heart.