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The poetry of John Donne is the passion behind an unfortunate wave of sexual dysfunction. The subconscious of certain sensitive young women wants Donne, and will settle for nothing less, rendering these women temporarily incapable of normal relations with the brute heart they find in their beds.
By Kathy Sarosdy
I wait for sleep to come.
My lover’s hair lies like heavy air
over my neck; he breathes across the tension
of my breast. Always
he goes before me. I am left
in a night that sounds itself,
closes on his waning pulse
against me. Then I see
your sphere of rising sun; lush
stabs of light scatter
in undulating air, and I try to
close my eyes—instead I open
to you. Read the mysteries
of my body, shudder down through dark
arms entangling me. Relentless
questions I almost ask
haunt the room: When was bitterness
ushered in? Does love only pacify?
What binds us? Whose responsibility
is joy? Afraid to know
and not to know, I tense
my arm and wake him, sigh
your breath. He rises,
stands at the window, assures me
the stars are there. Donne, Donne,
for God’s sake hold your tongue.
Kathy Sarosdy has worked as a pool hall barmaid, real estate secretary, bra fitter, plastic surgeon’s administrative assistant, merchantman operations manual editor, and, for the past 17 years, public school teacher. She currently teaches nonfiction analysis to delightful 11th graders and serves as Chair of the English Department at Kellam High School. She has been married for 25 years and has one son, Max.
She subscribes to Emily Dickinson’s definition of poetry: “If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.” More recently, she has expanded her poetry yardstick to include works that, when read in a steaming bath, startle her to the point of near drowning. In her own poems, she tries to turn experience—both real and imagined, both personal and observed—into a form that might bind her with anyone else. She recently began a series of poems inspired by her 87-year-old parents, and hopes that she will be graced with many, many years in which to complete the collection. •
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