Truth or Consequences

Tags

bareback, birth control, consequences, disease, erotica, pregnancy, punishment, sex, STDs

People in the erotica industry differ on their opinions about the consequences for sex. Actually, that’s not entirely true. It’s not the consequences they’re concerned about; it’s the punishment for it. It’s the food poisoning from the apple of the tree of good and evil. I’m talking about riding bareback and suffering the punishment: STDs and pregnancy.

Some writers feel the need to address it, to be responsible and to teach responsibility. Writers don’t have the same level of responsibility as porn stars to teach safe sex, since there’s an actual chance of physical consequences from sex in those cases, whereas you can’t get gonorrhea from reading a book (unless you’re doing it wrong). However, with the lack of really good sex education out there and the constant haranguing of anyone attempting to do so, some writers feel like they have a responsibility to show safer sex, but to also show consequences (punishment), because it’s real.

Let’s get this out of the way: Unless it’s relevant to the plot, I’m not going to address prophylactics and birth control. In real life, I have a pregnancy phobia (of me being pregnant, not of pregnancy in general) and a general fear of STDs. Nothing turns me off faster when I’m writing than being in the middle of a fantasy sex scene and suddenly worrying about my female character’s pregnancy, or worrying about that one night stand’s STD status.

In my opinion, I deal with enough sexual fear in real life to let it bleed into my fantasy world. There are lots of ways in which sex can be dangerous and exciting, such as sex with a stranger, sex with BDSM elements, sex on a cliff, etc. But STDs and pregnancy scares aren’t exciting. They’re just scary to me. In the erotica world, I don’t have to justify the lack of birth control or prophylactics, nor do I have to justify my characters riding bareback. In mainstream, I do, but I shouldn’t have to here.

Of all the places in the world, I shouldn’t have to fear sex here. Erotica is where sex, even dangerous sex, is safe. It may throw some people off not to include those concerns, but I just can’t do it. It’s not that I’m unaware of reality; I’m hyperaware of it, which probably accounts for a good deal of my celibacy.

It’s just that when I’m in the fantasy, I’m not looking for that kind of reality. I’ll delve into the deepest of sexual horrors, but I won’t touch those unless I absolutely have to, as a plot point. (And not as one of those conflict-resolution-through-baby plots. Just saying.) There’s enough punishment for sex in real life; erotica should be able to transcend that.

Poem: Fallen Idol

Tags

bdsm, dominance, erotica, master, poem, poetry, submission

"Fallen Idol"

All it took was a small push
And my false idol cracked
With impurity
Perched precariously
On the edge of his niche.

My idol would have to change
If it were to be strong
And pure
And real
Not some god whose brow
Seemed alabaster
But became china plasticine
With a little illumination.

But where to find
My idol
When my life had been devoted
To One
My self enveloped in his worship?

As always, in his Destructor
Before the masque ends,
The scarlet, smoky bane of his existence
And death.
Death would find the false immortal
And have him shatter in splinters
On the dirt floor.

There must always be a replacement
For an obsessive daughter.
We like to give patronage
To the pure
And with his imminent fall,
The insubstantial one who was once
Simply a doll
Terrycloth and cotton
Becomes a tin soldier meant to grow
Into the idol that my once-master once was.

So I go to him in white.
They put me in chains,
But how can I mind chains that I choose?
My marionetting doll circles and shapes me,
Looking for motive
When all I have is worship,
A need
For an idol,
For I am rich and desire possession.

He strips me until I become his china,
Caresses me like a fine vase,
Looks for my imperfections,
Finds them everywhere,
And mends them with new glass.
At last, my incense offering is accepted.
The new idol is placed in the niche
Earthy wood and paint
To wait
Until this idol wears thin.
I am the willing precious sacrifice
For all fallen idols.

Poem: Woman Riddles

Tags

erotic, erotica, f/f, lesbian, mythology, poem, poetry, sphinx, supernatural

I write poetry so infrequently (and clumsily). I feel kind of pretentious when I do. I’m not saying poetry is pretentious, not at all, just that I feel pretentious when I do it. However, I do have a few rough jewels that I enjoyed writing, so I’m going to share a few now and then.

"Woman Riddles"

She lies beneath the wide palm
With her serene smile paralyzed on her face
In the midst of two times, ethereal, finite.
Girls, girls, girls, always girls…
Pass ignorant by her tree.

For centuries, sitting, staring, so calm,
Shadows moving over her lithe body, living lace,
And in velvet paws claws gleaming in the light
While down her back flow dark curls
Unfettered and still, hardly free.

In this empty, timeless amulus of haze,
The woman looks upon her luscious prey.
Luminous eyes catch those of the wanderer.
The dreamer with dark skin
And sun-speckled eyes distant.

Somehow, the girl felt the lioness gaze
And froze, half-seeing the woman as she lay
Quiet in the shadows on the other side, the Great Ponderer,
The Knowing One, the centaur’s kin,
The one between worlds, sunbeams bent.

She is unseen and seeing,
Her golden eyes withhold secrets untold,
Waiting wet always for the one who might
See her in her steady state
Of half heat, of half being, of half need.

Fur tawny and clean, sweat glistening
On her forehead, full lips so bold
With aggression, belly fluffed with white,
The sort of creature that dark-skinned Cate
Sees not with any knowledge, but creed.

A creed of all dreamers who live
In worlds long forgotten,
Imagined secondhand in daily corners
And half-drawn, mildewed bus stops.
Cate, the one chosen, sees beyond.

Beyond what? The rabid hive
Of fear and indifference begotten
Of difference, phobia, foreigners,
Not in race but of a girl who tops.
Cate was well-accustomed to the unwelcome sound.

Her memory was filled with harsh, pyrite words.
Sulfur surrounds her nights of bare women
Whose desires were as natural as silver ore
And mango fruit, sweet between the legs.
Lovely round thighs and fingers in the hair.

It all came down to disguised interest slurred,
The answer to the famous riddle among men:
Why don’t they want us? or
Why do they want to be us? he begs.
And they answer with simple words and care.

They simply don’t want either, knowledge early or late.
The simple answer the Sphinx knows.
The answer on the tip of Cate’s tongue
As the woman draws her, crackling, through
And against her sun-warmed stomach.

The sphinx leans down and whispers to Cate,
“Pretty young girl, of short skirts and cornrows,
Lipstick and leather, goddess among
Paper dolls, I offer you more than they ever can do.
Just answer me one thing.” Her tail gives a coy flick.

She curls her large, supple body around Cate,
Possessive as always of that entrusted to her.
The girl trembles and feels ribbons of heat
Through her hands and breast
Until she clings to coarse fur.

“Why do you wander so late
From your small, little town, where once you were
Hated by little minds, little meat?”
The Sphinx with tail and tongue caresses
Poor Cate, the enchantment filling her.

“This is my way, my girl, answer me now,”
The Sphinx commands, cello voice strung tight.
“An answer right or I devour,” for she is wild.
Cate shivers silently in this strange place
In spite of the ever-present, concupiscent sun shining.

The Sphinx only smiles, her head in a bow
As she nuzzles Cate’s neck until Cate reaches to the light.
Her mouth makes no sound but kiss, neither harsh nor mild.
The Sphinx can see in her face
That she will stay. Cate answers nothing.

Switch

Tags

erotica, general audience, writing

For the last few years I mostly worked on erotic stories. Part of it was to experiment within the genre, to try to write a few novels and to get some short stories under my belt. But I also write novels for general audiences, and after writing primarily erotica for the last few years, it’s amusingly difficult to get my head out of the erotic mindset now that I’m also writing again in other genres.

The kind of mindset where everything is about sex. In gen aud pieces, sex and sexual thoughts can be present, even present often if it fits the character or the situation, but they aren’t as ubiquitous and constantly integrated into the plot as in erotica. People aren’t making innuendos or falling into bed or thinking about falling into bed in every chapter (sometimes more than once).

The kind of mindset where you’re moving through your story and wondering, How do I make this sensual or sexual? or How would sex work with this plot point?

The kind of mindset where you pair your characters like wild hyenas. Almost everyone gets together with at least one other person. If it’s not explicit, it’s implicit.

The kind of mindset where sex has fewer consequences and is always fucking amazing. Actually, there’s some flexibility with this even in gen aud works, I’ve noticed.

Of course, writing both can lead to some anxieties. Like: What if someone finds out? With our simultaneously sex-craved and sex-fearing culture, indulging in some wicked typing (*wink wink nudge nudge* know what I mean? oh, whatever) can, at best, impair your credibility and, at worse, lead people to label you a corrupter.

I continue doing what I do, hoping that I can stay lucky, and if I can’t, hoping that I have the fortitude to face it and defend what I do – and I’m something of a coward. But it isn’t wrong; it isn’t sick; it isn’t unsafe; and it isn’t low. I love it, and it’s beautiful.