The Poetry of Sex (11 page)

Hombres necios que acusáis

a la mujer sin razón,

sin ver que sois la ocasión

de lo mismo que culpáis:

si con ansia sin igual

solicitáis su desdén,

¿por qué quereis que obren bien

si las incitáis al mal?

Combatís su resistencia

y luego, con gravedad,

decís que fue liviandad

lo que hizo la diligencia.

Parecer quiere el denuedo

de vuestro parecer loco,

al niño que pone el coco

y luego le tiene miedo.

Queréis, con presunción necia,

hallar a la que buscáis,

para pretendida, Thais,

y en la posesión, Lucrecia

¿Qué humor puede ser más raro

que el que, falto de consejo,

el mismo empaña el espejo

y siente que no esté claro?

Con el favor y el desdén

tenéis condición igual,

quejándoos, si os tratan mal,

burlándoos, si os quieren bien.

Opinión, ninguna gana:

pues la que más se recata,

si no os admite, es ingrata,

y si os admite, es liviana

Siempre tan necios andáis

que, con desigual nivel,

a una culpáis por crüel

y a otra por fácil culpáis.

¿Pues cómo ha de estar templada

la que vuestro amor pretende,

si la que es ingrata, ofende,

y la que es fácil, enfada?

Mas, entre el enfado y pena

que vuestro gusto refiere,

bien haya la que no os quiere

y quejaos en hora buena.

Dan vuestras amantes penas

a sus libertades alas,

y después de hacerlas malas

las queréis hallar muy buenas.

¿Cuál mayor culpa ha tenido

en una pasión errada:

la que cae de rogada

o el que ruega de caído?

¿O cuál es más de culpar,

aunque cualquiera mal haga:

la que peca por la paga

o el que paga por pecar?

Pues ¿para quée os espantáis

de la culpa que tenéis?

Queredlas cual las hacéis

o hacedlas cual las buscáis.

Dejad de solicitar,

y después, con más razón,

acusaréis la afición

de la que os fuere a rogar.

Bien con muchas armas fundo

que lidia vuestra arrogancia,

pues en promesa e instancia

juntáis diablo, carne y mundo.

Silly, you men – so very adept

at wrongly faulting womankind,

not seeing you’re alone to blame

for faults you plant in woman’s mind.

After you’ve won by urgent plea

the right to tarnish her good name,

you still expect her to behave –

you, that coaxed her into shame.

You batter her resistance down

and then, all righteousness, proclaim

that feminine frivolity,

not your persistence, is to blame.

When it comes to bravely posturing,

your witlessness must take the prize:

you’re the child that makes a bogeyman,

and then recoils in fear and cries.

Presumptuous beyond belief,

you’d have the woman you pursue

be Thais when you’re courting her,

Lucretia once she falls to you.

For plain default of common sense,

could any action be so queer

as oneself to cloud the mirror,

then complain that it’s not clear?

Whether you’re favoured or disdained,

nothing can leave you satisfied.

You whimper if you’re turned away,

you sneer if you’ve been gratified.

With you, no woman can hope to score;

whichever way, she’s bound to lose;

spurning you, she’s ungrateful –

succumbing, you call her lewd.

Your folly is always the same:

you apply a single rule

to the one you accuse of looseness

and the one you brand as cruel.

What happy mean could there be

for the woman who catches your eye,

if, unresponsive, she offends,

yet whose complaisance you decry?

Still, whether it’s torment or anger –

and both ways you’ve yourselves to blame –

God bless the woman who won’t have you,

no matter how loud you complain.

It’s your persistent entreaties

that change her from timid to bold.

Having made her thereby naughty,

you would have her good as gold.

So where does the greater guilt lie

for a passion that should not be:

with the man who pleads out of baseness

or the woman debased by his plea?

Or which is more to be blamed –

though both will have cause for chagrin:

the woman who sins for money

or the man who pays money to sin?

So why are you men all so stunned

at the thought you’re all guilty alike?

Either like them for what you’ve made them

or make of them what you can like.

If you’d give up pursuing them,

you’d discover, without a doubt,

you’ve a stronger case to make

against those who seek you out.

When she doesn’t want to make love

he says,
What’s wrong?

As if something must be.

She says,
There’s nothing wrong.

He says,
But there must be something wrong.

The master, needing reasons.

She feels she should

have a note from her mother …

Dear Sir

would you please excuse my daughter from sex

the time of the month is not right

she’s worried about the telephone bill

an earthquake rocked Tokyo tonight

she’s afraid of waking the baby

Halley’s comet won’t pass again for sixty-seven years

she’s afraid of making a baby

and the Dow Jones index showed

an unfavourable low at close of business

and you probably did it last night

two nights ago at the most …

He nudges her with his elbow.

Go on, you can tell me what’s wrong.

Was it something I did? Something I said?

But there’s nothing wrong, I keep telling you!

Deflated, he heaves towards the wall,

taking his questions, and most of the blankets.

Freezing on the edge of the world

she knows that nothing is wrong,

for tonight she has learnt three things;

Sexual intercourse began

In nineteen sixty-three

(which was rather late for me) –

Between the end of the
Chatterley
ban

And the Beatles’ first LP.

Up to then there’d only been

A sort of bargaining,

A wrangle for the ring,

A shame that started at sixteen

And spread to everything.

Then all at once the quarrel sank:

Everyone felt the same,

And every life became

A brilliant breaking of the bank,

A quite unlosable game.

The tits that crashed a thousand cars,

a hot knife through the city’s bars,

full complement of facial scars –

Bloody hell, it’s Barbara!

All thunder thighs and lightning hair,

resplendent in her underwear,

I want that one, it isn’t fair!

Bloody hell, it’s Barbara!

Well versed in dark romantic arts,

she feeds each night on fledgling hearts,

indeed on any private parts –

Bloody hell, it’s Barbara!

Bloody hell! OMG!
Sacré bleu!
It’s Barbara!

As sumptuous and stylish as a Gothic candelabra.

I want to dock my dinghy in the safety of your harbour.

A bidet full of ice would not begin to cool my ardour.

The kind of broad that gangsters rate,

the type to make kings abdicate,

enough to turn the Navy straight –

Bloody hell, it’s Barbara!

Boudicca but soaked in liquor,

tactless as a bumper sticker,

Oh la la, my dicker ticker!

Bloody hell, it’s Barbara!

Think boozy busty nightclub rep

meets Super Nanny all windswept,

I think I need the naughty step –

Bloody hell, it’s Barbara!

Bloody hell! What’s all this? Free Tibet! It’s Barbara.

Imagine Mrs Robinson, if she had come from Scarborough.

She twists herself around you like clematis on an arbour.

In every English town a fella’s weeping to his barber.

Bloody hell, it’s Barbara!

Bloody hell, it’s Barbara!

Her love is aching arteries,

her night caps nips of anti-freeze,

my sonnets bawdy journalese,

as sure as pepper makes you sneeze

and Russians come from overseas,

I want you Barbara, can I please,

I need to hear you pant and wheeze,

I’m begging you, I’m on my knees,

just give me all your STDs –

Bloody hell, it’s Barbara!

Just after the interview, he’d groped

her breasts inside her low cut dress.

She didn’t resist. And so it went on.

Disarmed by his cool persistence,

she agreed to this tryst in town.

The Mercedes had deep leather seats

and tinted windows, dimming her view

of the naked women washing in ditches

along the road to Enugu.

The narrow room was stifling hot

in the afternoon. The Professor,

so charming, so well-read, sweated

as he slurped his bush meat soup,

sat beside her on the single bed.

She’d asked for a club sandwich and coke

but it hadn’t come and nothing was said.

He wiped his mouth, removed her dress,

arranged her like books on his desk,

Scanning her nakedness like a good report,

he straddled her, unbuttoned, taut.

But when his hand rubbed up against

her swollen shaft, a gasp, ‘What’s that?’

Then, proud of recalling the quirky fact,

‘Oh right. You people don’t remove that bit,

isn’t it?’