seeking sustenance

This poem expresses the awakened sexuality, the feral hunger of the poet. It is lways interesting to read the poet's more sexual works, because even in animal cravings, he doesn't lose the sophisticated imagery and wordplay. One of his favorite characters in all of literature is Viscomte de Valmont from Pierre Cholderlos de Laclos' "Les Liaisons Dangereuses" (he considers the character close to what he would be like if he surrendered his principles), who was able to be the sexually gluttonous libertine while retaining the precise manners of his time and station. As the poet himself would say, all art depends on resonance.

seeking sustenance

If I am unwelcome in the light
then let me swell in your darkness
where crests desire in inspired fire,
words burn as wards to turn denial back.

I crave more than mere acknowledgement,
spent smiles and ancient miles stretch back
and far beyond faded horizons forgotten,
give me your sweat, your blood, your heat.

Feed the need of this awakened beast,
released to feast on life and the consecration
of the moment, the spark, the dark spire
that awaits a worthy goddess to name the temple.

Whisper words to draw me to your shell
and I will swell to fit the form you warm
in perfect presence of the present, tensed
to sense the texture of a touch immortal.


William F. DeVault. all rights reserved.