[Gail White]

Frankly, I love sexually deviant poetry, from limericks to Catullus.
That said, I was a virgin until marriage at age 22.

[Ed Shacklee]

A lark for me, either as a bird or a noun.

To get back to Norman's post, I'm still not sure what the term 'sexual deviance' is meant to encompass. I can't recall the last time I saw a poem about incest or pedophilia anywhere, let alone on the Sphere, so I'm assuming the definition is broader, but how broad?

My own take is that sex of whatever stripe, despite its attractions, is a red herring. I may not be sure how deviance is defined in this context, but I have a very clear personal sense of what a 'crappy' poem is, and that's the word that stuck out in the original comment, for me. Definitions vary, but bad writing is one of the few taboos everyone here would agree on; and however we as individuals respond to a bad poem, I don't think that should change very much, whether it has its knickers on or not.

Ed

[Laura Heidy-Halberstein]

Originally Posted by Michael Cantor

Bonobos don't weep.

Of course they don't. Why would they?

[Rose Kelleher]

Oops - I meant to send a PM and somehow posted it publicly.

As long as I'm here, what the heck. I was writing to Bill Lantry to tell him how much I liked his post. I also mentioned that I'd made an observation vaguely similar to Norman's "That said" bit on page 2 of my little essay in SCR 12, "On Poetry and Perversion":

"Not because they’re puritanical, mind you — they’re oh so emphatic about that..."

http://shitcreek.auszine.com/issue12...nd-perversion/

In other words, Norman and I observed something similar. I see a critic defensively denying that he's puritanical, and I think, "He protests too much; he has a problem, and can't give the poem a fair reading." Norman sees the same thing and thinks the critic is being needlessly apologetic about his attitude. Either way the critic is being less than honest.

[Carol Trese]

Never mind.

[W.F. Lantry]

Rose,

No matter the cause of your return, it's good to see your name on my screen again!

Thanks,

Bill

[Quincy Lehr]

I tend to think that poets whose relations to both the sex act and, well, mind-altering substances (and I include the legal ones here) aren't a bit... well... complex tend to be boring, indeed rubbish poets. Not always, but usually. I'm not actually advocating any particular behavior, mind you, but I am, I suppose, enough of a Romantic to think that artists should be, at least to some degree, misfits and f%#k-ups and deviants.

Quincy

[John Whitworth]

What on earth is sexual deviance? If it means what it ought to mean then two of the greatest poets in the last hundred and fifty years, Hopkins and Emily Dickinson were both sexually deviant, just like the Pope. Unless some of you know under-the-counter stuff about Gerard and Emily the Great.

These days I suppose Marlowe would get more stick for his tobacco than his boies.

[Quincy Lehr]

Well, both were essentially celibate, which is pretty f%&ked-up, in my opinion, at least.

[Norman Ball]

Inserting 'deviance' into the thread title was an afterthought that came to me immediately on the heels of not giving much forethought to all that transpired beneath it. However as no placebo thread was erected, we can only speculate on how much more prurient interest this misnomer drew. My thinking is maybe gobs more. Poetry had little to do with it either. It was more a quirky behavioral observation on poetry forum commentary relating to posted poems with sexual content.

Lance lays bare one of my own suspicions: "I see the decline of reserve connected closely to the rise of free verse."

The free verse credo of 'letting it all hang out' without formal inhibition or stricture can easily devolve into gratuitous over-exposure. Whereas form prohibits certain trespasses and thus retains a reticent element.

Roger said the whole thing funnier and in fewer words too, always a bonus:

"It's pre-emptive, Norman. The author of a sexually explicit poem often accuses negative critics of being prudes, so the critic needs to establish his or her credentials for ribaldry in order to have standing to say the poem is horrible."

Rose offers a far more developed and compelling read here:

http://shitcreek.auszine.com/issue12...nd-perversion/

The best fun comes from discussing sex in a manner that has one appearing to be dragged kicking and screaming towards it. Horrible poetry with explicit sexual content offers a gargantuan playing field upon which sexual teeth can be pulled with all the pain of a good feign.