Where To Find Good Erotic Writings?

My, my! You just penetrated all our readers' minds with your large, lengthy, deep…alliteration, BBB!

Erotic writings have been around forever, and it's only somewhat recently that the “unimaginative porno vocabulary” has seeped in. These kinds of works have their place, but I do understand what you're getting at here. Often, eroticism extends beyond intercourse, but that's largely lost today.

In grad school, I worked at a bookstore. Every week a couple came in and they would sit down and the man would read while his wife knitted. After weeks of this, I asked her, “Why don't you ever get anything to read? You're here for hours at a time, every weekend!” She replied, “I don't like the way books are written now. Comparing Shakespeare to John Grisham is like comparing my favorite Pinot Noir to Boone's Farm. They're both wine, but I barely associate them as such.”

So with that in mind, I'd suggest something written completely differently back when everything was written differently. If I had to make a suggestion, I'd go with “The Eve of St. Venus.” It was written a few hundred years A.D., although it's not known who composed it, nor is it complete. Unfortunately, only a few stanzas exist. Let me further frame it:

Though it was few hundred years after the death of Christ, a large number of people still celebrated the love goddess Venus in the old tradition. In April, Venus' own month, people would meet for the largest of these celebrations in order to rejoice in the ushering in of the miracles of spring. They'd decorate themselves in little more than flowers and praise Venus, specifically by reenacting her involvement in major episodes in Roman mythology: her falling in love with Adonis, the judgment of Paris, her capture with Mars in Vulcan's net, etc.

The poem's theme, as you might guess, is a night in April where men and women anxiously awaited the deity's arrival into nature, when spring would undergo its marvelous change.

In the final verse, the poem becomes decidedly personal – when nature is delighted by Venus' influence, he feels that he himself is withering away and is upset that Venus has overlooked him. As you read it, note that Venus is so regarded as love personified, not just as a deity, but something greater: love as much of a law of nature as a way of life.

I

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love. Spring is young, spring is the world reborn. In spring lovers make accord, in spring the birds mate and the woodland loosens her tresses under nuptial showers.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

II

To-morrow the marriage-maker of the love amid shadows of trees weaves her verdurous bowers of myrtle-spray; to-morrow she leads her bands on festival in the singing forests; to-morrow Dione declares her laws high enthroned aloft.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

III

To-morrow will be the day when the primal ether joined wedlock; when from the moisture overhead and the orbed sea-foam, amid green multitudes and finned horses, sprang Dione wave-born under nuptial showers.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

IV

She herself paints the crimsoning year with flowery jewels; herself coaxes swelling buds into warm clusters under the West Wind's breath; herself sprinkles dripping wetness of the glittering dew that the night-air leaves as it passes.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

V

Sparkling tears quiver in a heavy drip, the little splashing dew-bead holds together in its fall; the moisture that the stars distil on cloudless nights unfolds the maiden buds from their wet sheaths at daybreak.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

VI

So the petalled crimsons have unveiled their blush, and a flame of roses breaks from the warm clusters; the Goddess herself has bidden the roses loosen the raiment from their maiden buds, to be naked virgin brides in the fresh daybreak.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

VII Compounded of Venus' blood and of love's kiss and of jewels and of flames and of flushes of the sun, to-morrow the bride unashamed will unfold from the wet cluster the crimson that lurked hid in its taper sheath.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

VIII The Goddess herself has bidden the nymphs go forth in the myrtle thicket; with the girl a boy goes in company; and yet it may not be deemed that Love is gone on festival if he carries his shafts. Go forth, nymphs; Love has laid by his weapons, he keeps festival.

IX

He has been bidden go forth unarmed, has been bidden go forth naked, that he might do no injury with bow nor shaft nor torch. But yet take heed, nymphs, because Cupid is fair; Love naked is complete, Love unarmed is the same.

X

Venus sends thee maidens as virginal as thou: “One thing it is we ask: retire, maid of Delos, that the woodland be unstained by wild creatures' slaughter, and trace her verdurous shadows over the fresh flowers. To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

XI

Herself she would ask thee, if she might bend thy virginity; thyself she would thou camest, if that were meet for a maiden; now for three nights wouldst thou see the bands pass along they glades amid assembled multitudes making festival.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

XII

Among flowery garlands, among myrtle bowers, Ceres and Bachhus are not absent, nor the god of the poets. All the night shall be kept awake with songs unceasingly; Dione shall be queen in the woods; do though retire, maid of Delos.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

XIII

The Goddess has bidden her judgment-seat be set amid flowers of Hybla; herself will preside and declare her laws, the Graces will sit beside her. Pour forth all thy flowerage, O Hybla. The whole foison, of the year; put on they garment of flowers, O Hybla, over all the plain of Enna.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

XIV

The country quickens with love's delight, the country feels Venus' touch; Love himself, the child of Dione, is deemed countryborn. Him, while the field broke to birth, herself she took up into her bosom, herself nursed with the dainty kisses of flowers.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

XV So now the bulls lay a broad flank upon the broom; each community is held together in wedlock-band. Lo, beneath the shade the bleating flock with their lords, and tuneful birds that the Goddess had bidden not be mute.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

XVI

Now hoarse-mouthed swans crash trumpeting over the pools; the maid of Tereus makes decant under the poplar shade, that you would think tunes of love issued trilling from her mouth, and not a sister's complaint of a barbarous lord.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

XVII

She sings, we are mute; when is my spring coming? When shall I be as the swallow, that I may cease to be voiceless? I have lost the Muse in silence, nor does Apollo regard me; so Amyclae, being mute, perished by silence.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.