Antonio Buentello
Dr. Jim Schrantz
English Composition II
02/20/2017
Sex without love
The poem, “sex without love” by Sharon Olds portrays the issues in our society today. Casual sex is something that has become acceptable and Olds is puzzled how one can have sex without loving the other partner. She states, “How do they do it, the ones who make love without sex?” (Line 1). She, however, describes sex with beautiful imagery of dancers, making it appealing, but the eventual feeling of loneliness is inevitable. Olds choice of words, imagery, and symbolism throughout her texts is contrasting; sex without love is possible, but is exemplified as a selfish empty act if love is absent.
Sex described in this poem is between two people who are not in love, and it’s vividly elaborated throughout the poem. Olds brings foreplay, tenderness, and good sex to mind “light rising slowly as steam off their joined skin” (Line 12); “fingers hooked inside each other’s bodies” (line 4); “how do they come to the come to the come to the God” (Line 8 ). These details of physical anatomy maintain it’s possible to have sex without love. However, at the end of it, are they mutually satisfied? As Olds concludes in her poem, it is clear that it’s selfish to have sex and not love your partner “which is the single body alone in the universe against its own best time.” (line 23).
Hooking up with no string attached as commonly known is rampant in today world. People do it just for their personal gains, to satisfy their lust and not necessary the other partners’. This form of sex has been in existent for centuries, and one form of it is prostitution, where people engage in sex for different reasons. If the women are selling her body, her motivation is money, while the man’s’ goal is to release. Olds is in awe of how people can enjoy the physical emotionless comfort and feels they are lost. “Love the priest instead of God” (line 15).
Love is a beautiful thing and with it comes tenderness, understanding, and compassion. “ Is falling in love or lust a matter of chemistry?” (Theresa 12). In the absence of chemistry and feelings during sex, then sex becomes meaningless. It’s like a great runner who focuses on himself and disregards other factors that affect his performance. Olds metaphorically compares the other partner as cold, wind, road surface which have an impact on his performance, but the runner chooses to ignore them and thinks he is alone. “They know they are all alone with the road surface.” (Line 18). Sex should be for two since it involves two people and the neglect of the other partner is a mean act.
Sex without love is unity and solitude happening simultaneously. At the beginning of the poem, sex is compared to dancers and ice-skaters gliding over each other, but in the end, it’s like a lone runner (Sutton, p.177). Emotions are not shared, and Olds states that “they do not mistake the lover for their own pleasures” (line 19) revealing how selfish the act is and commitment becomes a jargon to the lovers since they are only interested in themselves. “Sex without love is an empty experience, but as experiences go, it’s one of the best.” (Allen, p.1).
Lack of emotional intimacy in sex leads to suppression of feelings, and this can affect one’s ability to create an attachment, worst still, feelings of awkwardness crop. This is evident as Olds puts it in (line 7), “wet as children at birth whose mothers are going to give them away.” Mother giving away her child is a metaphor depicting dangers of unwanted pregnancies as a result of casual sex. The image of undesired childbirth illuminates negligence and irresponsibility since the lover’s intention was not bearing children.
Something else Olds suggests in her poem is that physical wants are much more of a driving force behind human behavior than emotions. The mention of ice skaters, dancers and a runner at the end of her poem is an indication that lovers with no feelings for one another consider sex as a game. “Beautiful as dancers, gliding over each other like ice-skaters over the ice.”(Line 2). In a game, usually, there is a winner and a loser. Therefore mutual satisfaction is not met. One partner is often left unsatisfied.
Situations where one of the partner’s expectations does not match the other leads to dissatisfaction, no matter how good the sex is. Love is a commitment. Sex without emotional intimacy is lust; needs habitually go unmet, and the connection is lost. Olds is particularly concerned how a runner can ignore important aspects of running and compares it to a lover ignoring his or her partner during sex (Crenshaw, 5). “The fit of their shoes, their over-all cardiovascular health—just factors, like the partner in the bed” (line 20). The fit of their shoes metaphorically means a condom, and cardiovascular health means the stamina to last the coitus. Ignoring these factors which could improve your running; in this case, sex, will prove detrimental in the love affair.
Wouters (5) states, “For both genders, sex for the sake of sex changed from a degrading spectre into a tolerable alternative.” Sex is however acted on for many reasons; like recreational, relieving stress, curiosity, lustful adventures, passing time or maybe for no reason at all. However, the most fulfilling sex is the one which love is present. Sex is supposed to be intimate, and the weird feelings accompanying a one night stand don’t feel right. Olds seems to have only had sex with a person she loves and that’s why she’s looking for answers. “How do they do it, the ones who make love without love?”(Line 1)
“How do they come to the come to the come to the God” (line 8); “come to the still waters and not love the one who came with them, light rising slowly as steam of their joined skin?”(line 11); “These are the true religious, the purists, the pros, the ones who will not accept a false Messiah, love the priest instead of the God”(line 15). Olds openly includes some religious reasoning and tries to bring morality into the picture. For example, it is morally wrong to not be married to a person and still enjoy sex with a person outside of marriage. Also, using putting the love of a priest before loving God as an example openly in the text.
Conclusion
Since lovers lack emotional connection, their sexual desires, however, can make them forget to use a condom, and this can result in unwanted pregnancies and diseases. Sex described in this poem is tantalizing, but the aftermath is somber. One is left feeling alone, and as Olds conveys, “Like the partner in the bed, and not the truth, which is the single body alone in the universe against its own best time” (line 23), she literally incorporates the problematic themes evident in contemporary society. Sex without emotional intimacy and long-term commitment is just a physical exercise. In this case, the reader gets to understand the moral teaching that Olds tries to convey to the society.
Work cited
Sutton, Brian.”Old’s Sex Without Love.” The Explicator 55.3 (1997): 177-180. Rpt. in Twentieth-Century Poetry Criticism. Ed. Janet Witalec. Vol. 22. Detroit: Gale, 2003. 339-340.
Crenshaw, Theresa Larsen. The Alchemy Of Love And Lust. 1st ed. New York: Putnam, 1996. Print.
Wouters, Cas. Balancing Sex And Love Since The 1960S Sexual Revolution. 1st ed. Print.
Allen, Woody. Our Favorite Woody Allen Film Moments. The Guardian. 2011. Web. https://www.theguardian.com/film/features/apicturestory/0,6412,557882,00.html
Olds, Sharon. “Sex without Love.” The Iowa Review 12.2 (1981): 264-264. Web.
http://ir.uiowa.edu/iowareview/vol12/iss2/89