14 Ways to Have the Best Sex of Your Life
Apparently it helps to have a staff to stage
the best sex of your life—someone to rip petals
from rosehips; someone to tend the stands
of candle, lighting the route from foyer to boudoir—
and a staff for the aftermath, someone to chase
the shank buttons down, wherever they caromed to
whenever the gown’s pearl spine tore; a laundry;
a tailor; someone to comb the bearskins
profaned before the fire. And it helps to have
no allergies, at least not to shellfish or latex
or leather. Lucky are the limber, the screamers,
the lovers of those without a gag reflex. And lucky
the lady in front of me, purring in the checkout line,
swallowing hard as she reads a set of instructions.
the best sex of your life—someone to rip petals
from rosehips; someone to tend the stands
of candle, lighting the route from foyer to boudoir—
and a staff for the aftermath, someone to chase
the shank buttons down, wherever they caromed to
whenever the gown’s pearl spine tore; a laundry;
a tailor; someone to comb the bearskins
profaned before the fire. And it helps to have
no allergies, at least not to shellfish or latex
or leather. Lucky are the limber, the screamers,
the lovers of those without a gag reflex. And lucky
the lady in front of me, purring in the checkout line,
swallowing hard as she reads a set of instructions.
May / June 2023
Jane Zwart teaches at Calvin University, where she also co-directs the Calvin Center for Faith & Writing. Her poems have appeared in Poetry, The Southern Review, Threepenny Review, TriQuarterly, and Ploughshares, as well as other journals and magazines.
Art: Jennifer Peart. Lost Conservatory, acrylic on wood panel, 12” diameter