Where Sex and Love Collide

I've always liked to write. I recently found the little poem below, written when I was 18 years old. Seems as though I had some issues confusing sex and love - feeling close to someone and mistaking it for a feeling of love. Guess it's fortunate I've had 22 years to ruminate on this. 


At this point in my life, I have a lot of experience to draw on, experiences that span a large range of emotions and physical feelings. I've learned that there are different shades of love, that love is not all or nothing, that love is not always perfect the way "they" tell you it is. You can love someone to the point that it bursts your heart wide open and that may still not be enough.

I've learned that love is not just an emotion, it's an attitude and an action. It's something that you do every day, not just when the mood hits you. It's a promise, a certitude, which is why when it's broken it is so hard to get back. LOVE in that sense, is exclusive. 

I have had feelings of affection for people, loving feelings which in turn have elicited a loving attitude, loving gestures and overtures which then become a commitment. That commitment is that I care about you and I am here for you unless something happens that we agree otherwise. We all have these loving feelings for our friends, our families, children, even our pets. They are different shades of love because they don't involve sex or sexual feelings and they don't indicate familial responsibility like a husband and wife. But they are all love.

The feeling of raw lust is a powerful drive that sets us on fire. When combined with feelings of love, there is nothing that can match it! But sex has nothing to do with love other than that they oftentimes coincide.  For me, that has not happened often, those feelings of genuine love AND forceful sexual attraction. I have felt powerfully pulled to have sex with someone, genuinely lost in lust, drowning in the physicality of it, with no love at all. The point is, giving in to the power of sex can be intoxicating, but it is not love. Sex is an action to be sure, but it's not the sustained action of love. Sex may overtake your mind, it may drown your body and make you ache for more, but that is called lust, not love. You can make a choice to not act on lust, but it is almost impossible to not act on love. The burning of lust fades quickly, like fireworks, where the burning of love sustains even the most horrendous, painful and horrifying events. You would not walk to the ends of the earth for someone because you want to fuck them; but when you love them, you would endure all manner of insults to your body, mind and soul. 

No Peace

She finds no peace in sleeping

She finds no peace awake

The only peace she finds

Is in every move he makes

The feeling of his body

Is committed to her mind

But the movement of his body

Is the only peace she finds.

If his body movement falters

She knows she still will need him

But at this moment

for the sake of peace

She's content to be beneath him

Joining with his rhythm

Pulsating as he moves

Finally she's satisfied

Her peace has turned to love.