Marie and Semele

You know the story of Semele, right? Zeus seduced her and impregnated her; then she asked to see him in his glory as King of the Gods and she was incinerated when he appeared as a lightning bolt. The story says that Hera put her up to it, out of jealousy. Meanwhile it was one more story to prove that Fucking With Gods can be dangerous. Don't try this at home.

Then one night during her last visit, Marie said it happened to her.

OK, not exactly. Not literally. But somewhere in the middle of a marathon orgasm she had an … experience … that was just, … well, … different.

Later we talked about it. She said it was hard to describe; maybe it involved saying the unsayable. I joked back that this is what poetry is for. She explicitly made the connection with Semele, and wondered aloud if all the stories of bad things happening to Zeus's mistresses might not have been simply pictures to describe otherwise unsayable sexual experiences. We talked some more, but only around the edges of things.

Yesterday, a week after she flew home, I went for a walk and fiddled with the idea a little bit and then sent her this. My excuse for intruding on her story was that, well, whatever she was going to write was probably not in dactylic hexameter. So our versions would be different.

Poets recite the old story of Semele struck by a lightning bolt.

Was it the kind that incinerates? Did she fall dead as a consequence?

Or was it a manner of speaking -- attempting to say the unsayable?

Lying abed with the Sky-father, clutching his greatness inside herself,

Feeling familiar ecstasies rising and crashing like ocean waves,

All of a sudden -- and standing apart from her usual raptures -- 

A shock shot its way through her body, from cunt to the crown of her forehead,

Throwing her sharply outside herself, as if her awareness stood next to her.

Poleaxed and awestruck, not breathing, and striving to hold the immensity

That batted away her perception like kitty-cats batting a thimble,

She fell on the soft bed adoring -- a heifer struck down for a sacrifice.

Some women live through a death like this. 

Semele might have been one of them.

A few hours later, she replied with her version. And sure enough, it wasn't in dactylic hexameter.

It must have been a god

It cannot have been mortal

 

The pleasure was a lightning bolt

it tore through me

it burned

 

it consumed me, I tell you

 

there was no part of me left

 

Yet after

I was intact

or I seemed so

 

It must have been a god

but when I could look

I saw you

I don't think I have anything more to say, other than to let the poems speak for themselves. Anything more from my side would just spoil it.

But wow. It was different.