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Poetry & Art of the Intelligently Erotic
Issue 1
| Lena Judith Drake - Your |
your fingers bear weight, now, when we entwine our hands
with a ferociousness, your clasp is firm, hard,
making certain i won't let go (and i won't, i squeeze your fingers back).
my lips begin to understand texture, feeling
and your skin is in every spectrum
ranges and patterns of light i can see still when blind
(your hand gripping my shoulder, telling me not to leave you,
spite duty, it says, forget others calling):
— your fingers cold and thin and individual
against my coaxing, reassuring mouth
(your face unrestrained, smiling, rebellious for that moment);
— your cheek impossibly soft and
pliant under my quick kiss
(your image in moods and non-moods, restraint, disbelieving awe,
the tiny, shaped-petal mouth willing);
— your lips forming some sort of unity with mine,
without moving, without diving, just holding,
fitting into shape
the strangesoftsensitivity that heightens,
leaving a shadow when you've pulled away, so i
can still feel your mouth
touching mine.
it is an awakening, not of desire, not of stomach-tightening
denial,
not even of innocence lost,
ideologies broken.
(all has happened before). an awakening
of awareness and slowness and tiny, gentle touches, nerves
on nerves, fingertips on the slope of your neck, pulse-points
touching and fluttering like our glances.
with a ferociousness, your clasp is firm, hard,
making certain i won't let go (and i won't, i squeeze your fingers back).
my lips begin to understand texture, feeling
and your skin is in every spectrum
ranges and patterns of light i can see still when blind
(your hand gripping my shoulder, telling me not to leave you,
spite duty, it says, forget others calling):
— your fingers cold and thin and individual
against my coaxing, reassuring mouth
(your face unrestrained, smiling, rebellious for that moment);
— your cheek impossibly soft and
pliant under my quick kiss
(your image in moods and non-moods, restraint, disbelieving awe,
the tiny, shaped-petal mouth willing);
— your lips forming some sort of unity with mine,
without moving, without diving, just holding,
fitting into shape
the strangesoftsensitivity that heightens,
leaving a shadow when you've pulled away, so i
can still feel your mouth
touching mine.
it is an awakening, not of desire, not of stomach-tightening
denial,
not even of innocence lost,
ideologies broken.
(all has happened before). an awakening
of awareness and slowness and tiny, gentle touches, nerves
on nerves, fingertips on the slope of your neck, pulse-points
touching and fluttering like our glances.
Table of Contents
Poems
Tanya Brinkman - Hellmouth,
My Sweet Incubus
Henry Sonsowski - Prescription
for Immortality
Bambi Barker - Redemption
Alane Lucas - Cavity
Eva Kilgore - After
Howard Good - Song #3
Jennifer A. Hudson - In
Between
Bo Sacker - Spring
Kenneth Gurney - Her Kiss
Alan King - Unnamed
Jessica Dawson - Saying
Thank You, The Girl is Like a
Goddamn Fortress,
Hindsight, Airplane
Doug Draime - Quiet Nights
G. David Schwartz - I Bay Up
to the Moon
David W. Landrum - Carnival
Glass
Jason Barber - Applause
Darcy Bruce - Marzipan
Britt Fleming - The Conversion
of Mass into Energy
Bruce Jewett - In the Sequoias
Lena Judith Drake - Your
Tommy Twilite - Hands
Harry Calhoun - Angels in the
storm
Art
Louie Crew - Two Old Men
Janet Butler - Torso Profile
Seated Nude, Reclining Nude
Peter Schwartz - Woman of
the Past
Additional Photographs
provided by Jessica Dawson
Poems
Tanya Brinkman - Hellmouth,
My Sweet Incubus
Henry Sonsowski - Prescription
for Immortality
Bambi Barker - Redemption
Alane Lucas - Cavity
Eva Kilgore - After
Howard Good - Song #3
Jennifer A. Hudson - In
Between
Bo Sacker - Spring
Kenneth Gurney - Her Kiss
Alan King - Unnamed
Jessica Dawson - Saying
Thank You, The Girl is Like a
Goddamn Fortress,
Hindsight, Airplane
Doug Draime - Quiet Nights
G. David Schwartz - I Bay Up
to the Moon
David W. Landrum - Carnival
Glass
Jason Barber - Applause
Darcy Bruce - Marzipan
Britt Fleming - The Conversion
of Mass into Energy
Bruce Jewett - In the Sequoias
Lena Judith Drake - Your
Tommy Twilite - Hands
Harry Calhoun - Angels in the
storm
Art
Louie Crew - Two Old Men
Janet Butler - Torso Profile
Seated Nude, Reclining Nude
Peter Schwartz - Woman of
the Past
Additional Photographs
provided by Jessica Dawson