Sex After 70by Naomi Beth Wakan
I sit across from my publisher who cuddles his coffee and explodes with “What!” “I’m writing a book on haiku,” I repeat calmly. “On haiku!” his face a-red. “Why can’t you write something people want to read like ‘Fishing on the West Coast’?” “Or Sex after 70,” I counter. “Yes, Sex after 70,” his eyes switch from exasperated to hopeful, “Now there’s a promising title!” We both fall silent. I imagine he is weighing up the odds of me being informed on the subject, while I do a quick survey of a possible table of contents. Sex and osteoarthritis— the joints locking in positions unheard of in the Kama Sutra. Choices—orgasm or muscle cramp; whether to allow myself the pleasure of orgasm or go into the pain of a concurrent foot cramp. Whether to focus on the vagina and the blissful dissolving or the foot and get that spasm dealt with and those toes straightened out. Decisions, decisions and before I know it I am thinking of nouns . . . those nouns of haiku and how each noun condenses a universe and packs a wallop, and how two, or three nouns together, if carefully chosen, can tumble you into the void and to universes beyond, and how the pause, the pause at the 5th or 12th syllable opens so many possibilities to dwarf all orgasms, or cramps come to that, and transforms dark crows on bare branches into cockatoos on plum blossom. “I’m writing the book on haiku,” I firmly address my publisher across the steam of his coffee. He sighs, takes a sip and asks, “When’s the first draft ready?”
This poem first appeared in Sex After 70 and Other Poems (Toronto: Bevalia Press, 2010). To learn more about Naomi and her many wonderful books, please visit her website. You can listen to Naomi Wakan reading this poem on CKGI radio, starting at around the 18:00-minute mark.
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