They called me Mishkal, well, those who did not despise me, that is. Others simply called me what I am; fag. I was not born a Jew, yet I was still of a persecuted people. I was born of the "pure" ones, the Aryans, and yet I faced the guns of the secret police along with the Hebrew, the single pink triangle among a sea of yellow stars, condemned to ride the death rails along with an endless number of breathing skeletons, those living corpses being transported from work camp to work camp as the Reich lost more and more of Poland. And I did it all for the sake of a lover who would later denigh me; peter at the gates.

In those days before the mustard gas and the mass crematoriums I was well off, the only child of a dentist and the daughter of a middle level beurocrat. Throughout the city of my birth I was known and loved as a tomcat and a playboy.

The women of the town did not know, my parents did not know, the Mon Signor of the Cathedral of Immaculent Hope, where I served ready to acolyte each morning, did not know. Only Rueben knew. He and he alone knew the burdens of my secret.

It was unheard of, illegal, and ultimately my downfall.

Times were different then. The SS came with riffles and goosestep, the Gestapo slunk through the cold shadows, buying secrets with pain or promises, and still I danced, painfully unawares, nieve, meeting my Rueben for a late dinner afterwards each night, awaking as if from a a splendid dream each morning to his lips trailing over my belly, my thighs. What else was I to do? I was 17, brought up to want for nothing.

A new sound was beginning to reach us across the Radio Free Europe, or on the large black Phonographic recordings smuggled in at great expence.so called "propaganda" in the form of swing was in high demand, and secret dance halls had sprung up in almost each section of town.

Times, as I said, were changing. The Chancellor of Germany, a homosexual, it was rumored, had risen to absolute power and invaded our small country. Spies abounded, and it surprised me not at all that it was young Engor, our neighbor boy, who informed on us. He was, after all, a member of Hitler's Youth, the young Nazi Boyscouts ( which might also explain the modern organizations loathing of queers ). It also supprises me not at all that he was awarded a medal afterwards.

Still in my mind I can see the poster that had been tacked to the poultry shop below the boy's room. It reflected the mood of the time better than anything else. It was a color poster, not inexpensive in those days, depicting a fine young German in his officer's dress, polished leather boots raised high above a cigarette above the caption, "stomp your faggots good "in large, bloody red script. It was a play on words, you see, another bit of imagery designed by the Gestapo psychologists and churned out by the SS propaganda machine.

No, I was not surprised at all to see Engor there that night as the greyshirts raided our small flat above the piano tuner's, bursting in the door to find Rueben and I still entwined beneath the sheets, slick with sweat and semen. No, not surprised; sickened. You would be too, child, had you seen the smug grin he wore.

We were separated, torn apart as if we were yesterday's Daily Press, beaten and subjected to tests designed to prove if we were homosexuals or not. A blond haired doctor, not at all unhandsome, roughly shoved three of his fingers up my ass, seeming to take a hidden perverse pleasure in violating me so. His tests must have been inconclusive; he gave it to me twice. I reeked of lard for weeks afterwards.

Often times I wonder if things might have been different had I not loved him, but then I scolded myself. Of course I had loved Rueben, as surely as I had loved that American soldier, Danny. And I could not, still cannot, bring myself to believe that he did not love me as well at some point.