Seeking momentary perfection in an infinitely flawed world
Midnight is safe
Shadows spy and cover sin
I am beautiful
Goddess in my own right
Child still exploring the world
Harlot
Acolyte
Myself
I explode with the dawn
Infecting the world with my fantasies
hopes
dreams
My butterfly wings
Set the world aflame
New day begins
I am my public self
Honest as possible in the real world
Never seems enough
Always too much
I am fragile, indestructible
A part of the world
Until midnight
We all do it. It’s a part of the daily routine for some of us. And usually, it includes at least some small bit of fantasy – our ability to put the real world aside for a moment and live in a world of our own creation. Apparently, this is something entirely unique to the human race.
Perhaps this is why we are the only species that actually masturbates to completion intentionally. Jesse Bering talks about our masturbation habits, how they set us apart, and the effect that porn may have on our creativity in his article on ScientificAmerican.com. He talks about how our unique brains give us the ability to conjure up images that arouse and enthrall us, encouraging us to pleasure ourselves. He also discusses how we are the only species known to masturbate to intentional climax, and how our sexual activity actually increases our fantasy creation and leads us to masturbate more often.
It’s a fascinating read, and it’s definitely gotten my mind working. Perhaps I’ll put the porn aside for a while, and let the movies in my mind take over….
If there is anything in the world that deserves reverence and worship, it is the miracle of the human body. It’s an incredibly complex machine, elegant in its design and awesome in its presentation. Each body is different, from the curves and angles to the basic chemical blueprint – a marvel and a universe on its own.
I love taking time to learn a new lover’s body, discovering that little mark that he’s forgotten about, that tickle even she didn’t know she had; to encourage my lover to feel worshiped, adored, loved; to explore the unique scent that only he can create, and how it changes; to compare the taste of the inner wrist to the curve of hip to the back of the knee; to revel in the intimate and singular gift with which I have been presented.
Exploring a new body is an adventure. There are sensitive twitches, taste variations, color shifts, scars to commemorate trials…an entirely new world to map and memorize. We all bear the marks of our lives, and our lovers use them to learn our histories in an intimate, unique way. The scraped knee that never quite healed, the surgery scar, the watchband tan line, the unexpected twitch when a certain spot is touched..the little details that build a person to completion are there, waiting to be discovered and inspire us to share our stories.
In the midst of industrial Cleveland, there is a pile of gravel. It’s a large pile, fenced in and deserted, a looming blob of slate gray – save for the single, large, pink flowering plant that’s burst from the side. It’s a shock of life in the dank, monochrome world around it, and a small beacon of hope that brightens my day. A blink later it’s gone, but the instant glance was all I needed.
I seem to have a fixation on lips – beautiful, shiny lips. Mouths open, waiting for something delicious – from strawberries to sex.
There’s always something. Women on the street, with latex lipgloss and pouty faces. Men with exceedingly smooth, active mouths and incredible diction spouting words with sharp edges and smooth curves. Pictures of kisses in the rain, wet and steamy with tongues battling and warm breath caressing moist cheeks. Climaxing women, convulsing wildly for the camera, jaws agape and panting for breath, with swollen lips and smeared lipstick. To see a mouth wrapped around a cock, or a tongue darting between the slick folds of a sweet cunt…
It’s distracting, I think.
In my hands your
body is a hymnal
open to the familiar
page of praise. I
sing you in the ancient
rhythm that brought
us all here to make
what we will of
this world, I sing
you in tongues and
in silent awe of our
loving, certain only
of imminent separation.
–Anne K. Smith, “Praise”
This rather short animation spoke to me deeply. Communicating well is a passion of mine, bordering on obsession. Thank you to Taylor Mali for crafting such a beautiful commentary, and Ronnie Bruce for the striking animation to go with it.
There wasn’t a reason for her to look at him – he hadn’t moved or made any noise. She did look, though, and was momentarily stricken with his eyelashes. Not something one usually notices on strangers, really.
He had his eyes closed, listening to some generic rap song turned up way too loud on his headphones. No doubt he’d normally be instantly judged as a troublemaker or a gang member, but in that instant all she could see was how young he was. Those thick eyelashes resting on cheeks still plump with baby fat…just a kid, trying to act like something resembling an adult. She automatically thought of all the times she’d cooed over adorable babies in that same state, and he was irrevocably imbued with that sweet innocence.
He got up and walked away a moment later, complete with the typical swagger of an arrogant young man…but the innocence on his face stuck with her until he disappeared from sight.
There are times when all it takes is a slowly drawn breath to make the world slow down. Everything seems to float, gently moving along its way at a fraction of its normal pace, and in the process the world gets brighter – at times painfully so.
Those are the moments where I lose myself in the endless beauty of mundane life – the purple flowers nestled in patchy grass by the sidewalk on my walk home from work, the swirled rust patterns on a fence, the iridescent feathers of the birds hanging out by the train tracks.
The train holds so many of those moments for me, especially in the mornings. The day hasn’t had a chance to get all hectic yet, and my mind is still mostly uncluttered. Crossing bridges seems to be a regular trigger, especially when I’m standing by the window. The trees are so close, unreachable through the plexiglass, yet I can sometimes feel the wind on my face and the rustling of the leaves.
There’s a road by the river that’s crumbling because the dirt beneath it is being washed away, and every time I see it I get a jarring pang – part devastation at the painful-looking crack in the cement, part joy and awe at the power of nature in the face of all our technology.
Watching the news and reading the papers can be a intense experience in the wake of a ‘natural disaster’. I feel for those whose entire lives have been uprooted, all belongings destroyed, and for those who have died – yet underneath that empathy is a celebration of the cycle that continues. New life comes from death and destruction, and the beauty and balance of it makes me ache with joy sometimes. When we take too much, Mother Nature will take it back in some form, and we can’t stop her.
She takes the train to work every day, and every day the view seems different. It all alters with the song playing through her headphones – sometimes she sees destruction, sometimes rebirth, sometimes both. It’s always beautiful, though, even in the occasional ugliness. Trash and old tires strewn down hillsides with trees and weeds growing wild around them, crumbling bricks of walls and buildings covered with snow and graffiti.
Sometimes she sees a post-nuclear world, where mankind has lost the main battle and has been relegated to its beginnings – gathering food from Mother Nature as she reclaims her planet. Buildings deserted and disintegrating under the weight of grass and trees, and animals using the ruins as new, more secure homes. It moves her violently sometimes, and she can get lost in that apocalypse so easily, until the rumbling of the train jolts her back to awareness.
Other times, she sees life bustling wildly – people hurrying to and fro, manic and lost in their own worlds, just as she appears at that particular instant. She wonders what they’re thinking, tries to guess at their deepest secrets, and wishes them well as they move past her without even registering her presence. She doesn’t miss being so self-absorbed – it kept her from noticing the flowers peeking through the cracks of concrete and steel.
