Five Unusual Sexual Practices From Around the World: A Poem

Will I ever learn these secrets
The ones at my fingertips
If only I would click

The practices
I engage in
Are less physical
More metaphysical

Suppose I am usual
Not all that open
To exploring my sexuality
Tired 41 year-old

Or that considering sexuality
Has become more elusive
Since we became parents
Since we became home-bound
Since we became sedentary

Or that sexuality
Has always been
Slightly terrifying
In that nakedness
Is so pure
And unavoidable

Or that the body
Is so full of questions
The hairs
And the smells
And the needs
The dreams
Of a body
Are too real;
They overpower
Everything else.

The world itself now
Out-of-reach illusions
Joke thirst hot not
Clouded by selfie-judgment
And exhibitionism
The word exhibitionism
No longer applies
When skin flies
Everywhere do we
Recognize tender touch
A hug is a threat
For all but the young ones

All are masked
Safely hidden
As we drift closer
To disembodied and fictitious
Screen selves.

***

To buy Invented Senses, my new collection of poems, click here:

https://www.blurb.com/bookstore/invited/9389525/5fbe7f0b9f950a103bedad83955cfcc0097acb30