Behind the veil

A few months ago, I had begun a separate blog for some devotional writings I was doing. But recently, I’ve been realizing some (yet again) new levels of integration in myself, so I decided to bring that writing over here to Vespertine, where it now belongs.

Because these writings are somewhat different than most of the things I post here, I’ve chosen to put them all together on a page rather than include them in the regular blog post chronology here.

Behind the Veil will be updated occasionally and not on any specific schedule, so you’ll have to actually check that page (found in the top navigation bar) once and a while if you’d like to see what’s new there.

Enjoy.

Woman, Waiting

This is something I had previously posted on Tea and Oranges and then later removed. Why, I don’t know… But here it is again. Because this is how I’m feeling… again.

We wait for breasts to bloom and hips to soften.
We wait for the the first day of summer, the first kiss, the first date.
We wait for the first pain of the first time.
We wait for the pleasure, eternally.

We wait for our first blood, and the next, and the next.
We wait for the Moon inside us to rise… and set… and rise.

We wait for the heartbeat, the quickening, the miracle.
We wait to schedule the appointment, to summon the courage.
We wait to begin nesting… or to come to terms with relief.

We wait for fate, the thing we feared most.
We wait for the diagnosis, the bitter medicine, some sympathy.
We wait for the sun.
We wait for the pain to stop.

We wait for the lover’s letter, the midnight call, our mother’s death.
We wait for the water to boil, the cake to bake, the roses to grow.

We wait for our men to come… to us, to themselves, to reason.
We wait for them to escape… the lure of another woman, the horrors of war, their father’s shadow.
We wait for them to return from the places we can’t go.

We wait for our sons to find kindness, our daughters to find forgiveness.
We wait for love, we wait for the light.
We wait for good-bye.

We wait for the first gray hair, the next generation, the last of the blood.
We wait for wisdom, we wait for someday, we wait for death.

But for tonight, I wait right here…
In this moment, this sanctuary, this breathing center of my whole life.

Tonight, I wait for the taking, for the filling, for communion.
Tonight, I wait for the end of waiting.

Tonight, I wait for you.

.

Image credit: China Hamilton

China Hamilton’s New Book: “Intimate Obsessions”

As you know, I adore China Hamilton’s erotic photography and have written several poems that were directly inspired by images he has created.

Some time ago, China expressed his interest in including some of my poetry in the new book he was planning to publish; a book of selected images spanning his photographic career. Needless to say, I accepted his rare and gracious invitation without hesitation, and looked forward to the time when I would hold the completed project in my hands.

And now that day has come, literally. I received my copy just this afternoon, and I am happy to finally be able to announce that Intimate Obsessions is now available.

An excerpt from China’s introduction to the book:

Some of my previous books have explored the extremes of submission, bondage and sadomasochism. This book though has returned to consider the other moments, the restful times, the gentle times and the times of anticipation of dark difficulties to come. I have for the first time let my publisher make the choices and decisions about content, giving free choice to another’s eye. Work is drawn from ancient negatives and very recent moments. . . . We therefore have snapshots of a creative journey, as it were. Some are soft and gentle, some strange and curious, some confrontational. Many of the contradictions in my own mind are shown here, but the changes in my view of the subject barely touch upon the million ways in which an individual alters, for a camera can easily record the minute variations of a personality in fractions of a second. Always, though, there is the darkness - both real and imagined.

For me, the overall feel of this current collection seems gently surrounded by silence, as if on every page we get a rare glimpse of a woman’s most private contemplations about her desire to be seen. As China points out in his introduction, the imagery in Intimate Obsessions is quite in contrast to the overtly BDSM-themed imagery of his previous books, Bittersweet Sex and The Cabinet of Dark Things.

And indeed, Intimate Obsessions almost whispers its presentation of the infinite world of women’s sexuality and yet, I found the experience of this book to be no less fascinating and, in its own way, just as disturbingly complex as China’s previous books.

While seeing one’s writing in a published form is always an exciting event, experiencing it in the lasting and unalterable form of a book is a different thing altogether. And even more so when that lasting form consists of the blending of one’s work with that of another. There is some alchemy in that, a magic that I find ultimately indescribable.

But, I can say this, and perhaps it is enough: after spending a late summer afternoon wandering through this book in its entirety, I feel, simply… content; deeply satisfied with, and even in some ways, nourished by the finished form it has become.

Thank you, China, for this opportunity. And thanks also to publisher Matthias Reuss for bringing such a beautiful book into form, and to all the sumptuous women who shared such exquisite moments of their lives so that these images could be made.

I am truly honored to have been included in this beautiful work, and I can only hope that the presence of my words serves well the poetic and visual intricacy that is already woven within these images.

You may view selected images from Intimate Obsessions and purchase the book directly from the publisher at Editions Reuss. To view China’s current online gallery and read more about his artistic philosophy, please visit his website.

China Hamilton’s Fine Art Photography

You’ll notice lately that I have been posting a few pieces which are accompanied by the beautifully erotic photographs of China Hamilton. Ever since I discovered his work a few years ago, I have been inspired by it both personally and creatively.

Every so often, one of his images and one of my poems seem to speak to each other. And when that happens, I include them here together for your pleasure. China has generously granted me permission to use his work here on my site, and I am delighted to be able to share it with you.

If you have not yet discovered China’s work, please visit his site and view the gallery (which changes from time to time). You may also purchase prints directly from him or at ObsessionArt.

That Moment

This is that moment made of love
but made treacherously in the heart
of love’s secret house.

This is that changeling moment
when your will rises and reaches
across the room, and your body
becomes bigger than it is
more than I think I can bear.

This is that lightening-like second
when I am stilled by a flash of terror
a force I don’t understand
which binds me more deliciously
than ever your hands could dream.

This is that surrendering moment
when my mind casts itself inward to wander
a corridor of reflections
a hallway leading to nothing
but you.

This is that instant when your eyes
rephrase their colors and your face becomes the one
that no one sees, and your voice…
becomes the reason I exist.

This is that moment, that immaculate moment
when you and I give way
and something - much more than us - wordlessly enters
our darkly mirrored room.

Photo Credit: China Hamilton

Naked

…I have torn to pieces my robe of speech,
and have let go of the desire to converse.
You who are not yet naked,
go back to sleep.

~ Rumi

He stands at the edge of the carpet, in the dark, beyond the window. I can’t see him, only his shadow falling toward me.

"Take it all off - the necklace, too."

Standing in a square of late summer moonlight, I strip myself down for him. Fingers fumbling. Embarrassed. Exhilarated. In love. Not with him - but with the surrendering thing he will make of me tonight, the wild freedom he will force us both to endure.

"Kneel."

Down through the heavy night air I go to my knees naked before him. I open my mouth because I know that’s what he wants. He steps quickly toward me out of the darkness and strikes my face with his hand.

Then he steps back and waits.

A gasp of denial, a flash of righteousness, the fierce awareness of my helplessness, the blurry beginning of tears…

But I blink and stay put. And I keep my eyes open, and my head up, as he tells me to.

The moon recedes behind a cloud, and returns. The ring of the slap fades and disappears beyond the edges of the room. The silence spins out between us and I wait. But he is waiting for me - waiting until it comes - that delicious unfastening, that graceful cascading fall of my invisible robes. He is waiting until my shoulders give the signal only he knows how to read.

Instantly, his cock is inches from my face, his entire body filling the space between us, removing all else from my vision.

"Now, open."

He licks his hand to wet his cock then slides the underside of the head gently along my waiting tongue.

"Look at me."

When my eyes are where he wants them, he begins to push. As I struggle to open, he grasps the hair on the top of my head, and - in one achingly slow thrust - pushes himself all the way into my throat. He utters no groan of pleasure, no grunt of ownership. He simply holds himself there, holding my head steady, gazing down, witnessing my struggle. Rigidly still, he breathes in, deep and ragged… and out, in hissing billows that surge down hotly over my face, my breasts.

Just before I panic, he pulls out as leisurely as he entered. He waits - a moment only - while I lurch forward to choke and cough and gasp. Then he guides my face back up to him and begins. Thrusting and withdrawing, first quickly then slowly, shallow then deep - he is teaching me how to pay attention, how to abide that in me which longs to yield.

When he pulls my head back to go deeper, I adjust and take him in again. When he pushes in fast and vicious, I gag and gasp at whatever breath I can steal, and take him in again. When he grips my neck and holds his cock deep in my throat until my vision blurs and my open palms slap at his unforgiving thighs, I sputter and choke and gasp and cry… and again, I take him in.

I struggle to open and open more, to enclose him, to be full of him. I struggle to stop struggling.

His unrelenting thrusts become the spinning world on which I kneel. His pleasure, brutal and absolute, becomes the gravity which holds me down. The uncontrollable guttural sounds he forces from my throat mark the new rhythm by which I breathe.

Again and again, he pounds into my mouth, into my every breath, re-defining me, paring me down to fit within the tight, rocking arc of his hips. And there, in that pinpoint of space, I am left alone, engulfed by the shimmering heat of my own surrender; sacrificed on the altar of my own willingness.

Suddenly, he becomes unbearably hard and the purity of his need for release allows my breath only the slightest, the barest chance - just enough to continue the struggle to live… and let go. And for a lifetime more, there is only that: gasp… and let go… gasp… and let go…

Holding my head steady, his thrusts come too fast and too hard and there is no breath left to gasp for, nothing left to let go. I am nothing but filled, stretched with the perfect agony of it, until

…he grabs a frantic fistful of my hair and yanks my head roughly away from him. Blessed air fills my lungs but not fast enough. I gasp and heave - great luxurious gulps of sweet, sweet air.

He grabs his cock, purple and glistening, in his other fist. There is a split second of stillness, a short mean grunt, and his cock spurts and splashes violently into my gasping mouth, across my face, into my hair… his whole body jerking again and again with the force of each surge until he has no more to give.

He stands above me, panting, slapping my face with his wet cock, smearing his come over my tongue and deeper into my mouth. And as I lick and lick and swallow what he feeds me, he breathes out little sighing syllables that remind me vaguely of my name, of my many names.

He steps back to watch as the moonlight illuminates my dark hair, my hot skin, the stains of his possession. And he watches, with the moon, how I finally dare to meet his eyes but keep my silence. He watches with caution how calmly I accept his violation, how well I wear his mark.

He knows that in making me his, I am becoming something else. He knows that he has given me a taste - the sweet salt tang of relentless love, unadorned. And he allows me, wet and trembling, to savor it, to stay on my knees before him… not vanquished or conquered, but wordlessly and wildly awake.

Photo Credit: China Hamilton

When the Heat Comes

When the heat comes, I will sit while it quickens inside, the secret root smoldering, filling the dark with a fire scent offering.

And you will watch me - waiting in the center of myself, blood-heavy and drunk with it.

When the heat comes, I will tighten and hold it in, denying vaporous ideas of freedom, refusing the seal its fissure.

And you will watch me - waiting at the edges of myself, sweltering and afraid.

When the heat comes, I will hold my legs together, yet not too near together as Kahlil commands, for a woman’s resistance and her surrender rise not in each other’s shadow.

And you will watch me - waiting obediently beside the two-ness of things, single-minded but not alone…

… until the heat can come no more and I can only close my eyes to your gaze and tremble breathless and mute, waiting to receive your hot green voice, its one exploding word: the flash that will burn us both away, and scatter the ashes far beyond this small chair in which you watch me live.

Photo Credit: China Hamilton

Between My Legs

his tongue makes the wet signs
that mark me as his
and he lifts me to his mouth
until my arms have nothing
to hold other than the measure
of a wingspan across the pillows

he closes his eyes and hums there
for me in the dark
singing of voices we’ll never hear
and a moon too young to see

and when he tastes deeper
for the salt and grief of me
he takes from my throat the cries
a woman can only make
when she becomes a great dark bird
racing upward through bronze trees
dreaming of light, dancing
along her very own curve of earth

Photo Credit: China Hamilton

Look How She Sees You

Look how She sees you with the eyes
of Her heart, the dark stars of Her knowing, forgiving
the dross you so carefully guard like gold

Look how gently She holds Her devotion in
the same rough hands that weave your fate
from the uneven threads you drop in your hurry

Look how She longs to slake your thirst
with tears that will someday become your own
sprung from the fresh and soaking spring of Her lap

Look how, even when you forsake Her, She offers
burnt things in your name and buries the remains
at mystifying roots of remembering trees

Look how She waits for you now, there between
the shadowy pillar of what cannot be exhumed, and
the pillar of brightness you cannot bear to become

Look how She will wait forever in that place
where you promised to bring the best of your harvest
the single fruit She expects to receive
the only gift She will bend to accept

Image: China Hamilton

She Came Again

She came again
to take the dark in hand
and comb it
into curtains of hair
and paint it
like broken shards of dream
on a face we both loved
too well to wear

Photo Credit: China Hamilton