Desire
Desire is not a synonym for sex and it is not a synonym for wanting. It is the body's motivated lean toward intimacy, beauty, or more contact — the architecture of being-pulled. Vela holds the erotic register at the center but does not collapse the social, the cognitive, and the devotional registers into it: the corpus reads desire across all four, and the texture is in the difference.
Working definition · Motivated pull toward intimacy, beauty, or more contact—not mere preference.
6874 passages · 2 Vela essays
Vela’s read on this emotion
Desire is one of the emotions Vela reads most carefully, because the English word covers too much ground to leave undifferentiated. Four registers run inside it.
The erotic register is the most familiar. Vela reads it through Carmen Maria Machado, Garth Greenwell, Sappho's surviving fragments, and Audre Lorde's essay *Uses of the Erotic* — writers who treat erotic desire as serious subject matter rather than ornament. The social register — the desire to belong, to be seen correctly, to matter to a community — runs through memoir and through the literature of exile. The cognitive register — desire for the right word, for understanding, for mastery — surfaces in Plato's *Symposium* and in Augustine of Hippo's *Confessions*, where desire is examined as a form of motion of the soul. The devotional register — desire for God, or for the absolute — runs through the *Song of Songs*, Teresa of Ávila, John of the Cross, and the broader mystical tradition.
Desire is not the same as yearning, longing, or love. Yearning is desire facing what it may not reach. Longing is yearning settled into chronicity. Love is the sustained orientation that survives desire's exhaustion. The four words are kin; Vela reads them separately because the writers who have been most honest about each have kept them separate.
*On Desire* — the slower companion essay in the magazine — walks the four registers and makes the case for not collapsing them.
Study and magazine
Long-form guide in the magazine
*On Desire* — the four-register reading. Desire as architecture, not virtue: how the word holds erotic, social, cognitive, and devotional registers at once, and what the writers keep saying when the four are not collapsed.
Read the guidePassages
Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.
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6874 tagged passages
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
I therefore struggled hard to crush my love; but one night, unable to overcome the maddening passion that was consuming me, I yielded to it and stealthily crept into her room. "By the rosy light of her night-lamp, I saw her lying, or rather, stretched across her bed. I shivered with lust at the sight of that pearly-white flesh. I should have liked to have been a beast of prey to devour it. "Her loose and dishevelled golden hair was scattered in locks all over the pillow. Her lawn chemise scarcely veiled part of her nakedness, whilst it enhanced the beauty of what was left bare. The ribbons with which this garment had been tied on her shoulder had come undone, and thus exhibited her right breast to my hungry, greedy glances. It stood up firm and plump, for she was a very young virgin, and its dainty shape was no bigger than a large- sized champagne bowl, and as Symonds says: "Her breasts shone like pinks that lilies wreath." As her right arm was uplifted and bent under her head, I could see a bushy mass of dark auburn hair under her arm-pit. She was lying in the enticing position of Danaë at the moment when she was deflowered by Jupiter in the shape of a golden shower; that is, her knees were drawn up, and her thighs widely apart. Although she was fast asleep, and her chest barely heaved as she drew her breath, still her flesh seemed to creep as if under the spell of an eager amorous desire, and her half-opened lips pouted forth ready to be kissed. "I quietly drew near the bed on the tip of my toes, just like a cat about to spring on a mouse, and then slowly crawled between her legs. My heart was beating fast, I was eager to gaze upon the sight I so longed to see. As I approached on all fours, head foremost, a strong smell of white heliotrope mounted up to my head, intoxicating me. "Trembling with excitement, opening my eyes wide and straining my sight, my glances dived between her thighs. At first nothing could be seen but a mass of crisp auburn hair, all curling in tiny ringlets, and growing there as if to hide the entrance of that well of pleasure.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
For my part, I will not pretend to describe what I felt over me during this scene; but from that instant, adieu all fears of what man can do unto me! they were now changed into such ardent desires, such ungovernable longings, that I could have by the sleeve, and offered him the bauble, which I now imagined the loss of would be a gain I could not too soon procure myself. Phœbe, who had more experience, and to whom such sights were not so new, could not however, be unmoved at so warm a scene; and drawing me away softly from the peeping hole, for fear of being overheard, guided me as the door as possible, all passive and obedient to her least signals. Here was no room either to sit or lie, but making me stand with my back towards the door, she lifted up my petticoats, and with her busy fingers fell to visit and explore that part of me, where I was perfectly sick and ready to die with desire; that the bare touch of her finger, in that critical place, had the effect of a fire to a train, and her hand instantly made her sensible to what a pitch I was wound up, and melted by the sight she had thus procured me. Satisfied then with her success, in allaying a heat that would have made me impatient of seeing the continuation of the transactions between our amourous couple, she brought me again to the crevice, so favourable to our curiosity. We had certainly been but a few instants away from it, and yet on our return we saw everything in good forwardness for recommencing the tender hostilities. The young foreigner was sitting down, fronting us, on the coach, with Polly upon one knee, who had her arms round his neck, whilst the extreme whiteness of her skin was not undelightfully contrasted by the smooth glossy brown of her lover’s. But who could count the fierce, unnumbered kisses given and taken? In which I could often discover their mouths were double tongued, and seemed to favour the mutual insertion with the greatest gust and delight.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
After breakfast, Charles (the dear familiar name I must take the liberty henceforward to distinguish my Adonis by), with a smile full of meaning, took me gently by the hand, and said: “Come, my dear, I will show you a room that commands a fine prospect over some gardens”; and without waiting for an answer, in which he relieved me extremely, he led me up into a chamber, airy and lightsome, where all seeing of prospects was out of the question, except that of a bed, which had all the air of recommending the room to him. Charles had just slipped the bolt of the door, and running, caught me in his arms, and lifting me from the ground, with his lips glued to mine, bore me trembling, panting, dying with soft fears and tender wishes, to the bed; where his impatience would not suffer him to undress me, more than just unpinning my handkerchief and gowns, and unlacing my stays. My bosom was now bare, and rising in the warmest throbs, presented to his sight and feeling the firm hard swell of a pair of young breast, such as may be imagined of a girl not sixteen, fresh out of the country, and never before handled: but even their pride, whiteness, fashion, pleasing resistance to the touch, could not bribe his restless hands from roving; but, giving them the loose, my petticoats and shift were soon taken up, and their stronger center of attraction laid open to their tender invasion. My fears, however, made me mechanically close my thighs; but the very touch of his hand insinuated between them, disclosed them and opened a way for the main attack. In the mean time, I lay fairly exposed to the examination of his eyes and hands, quiet and unresisting; which confirmed him the opinion he proceeded so cavalierly upon, that I was no novice in these matters, since he had taken me out of a common bawdy house, nor had I said one thing to prepossess him of my virginity; and if I had, he would sooner have believed that I took him for a cully that would swallow such an improbability, than that I was still mistress of that darling treasure, that hidden mine, so eagerly sought after by the men, and which they never dig for, but to destroy. Being now too high wound up to bear a delay, he unbuttoned, and drawing out the engine of love assaults, drove it currently, as at a ready made breach... Then! then! for the first time, did I feel that stiff horn-hard gristle, battering against the tender part; but imagine to yourself his surprise, when he found, after several vigorous pushes, which hurt me extremely, that he made not the least impression. I complained, but tenderly complained: “I could not bear it... indeed he hurt me!...”
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
"His moist lips grazed mine so very slightly that I hardly felt their touch; they thus only awakened in me the eager desire to feel their contact more closely, whilst the tip of his tongue kept tantalizing mine, darting in my mouth for a second and rapidly slipping out again. His hands in the meanwhile passed over the most delicate parts of my body as lightly as a soft summer breeze passes over the smooth surface of the waters, and I felt my skin shiver with delight. "I happened to be lying on some cushions on the couch, which thus elevated me to Teleny's height; he swiftly put my legs on his shoulders, then, bending down his head, he began first to kiss, and then to dart his pointed tongue in the hole of my bum, thrilling me with an ineffable pleasure. Then rising when he had deftly prepared the hole by lubricating it well all round, he tried to press the tip of his phallus into it, but though he pressed hard, still he could not succeed in getting it in. "'Let me moisten it a little, and then it will slip in more easily.' "I took it again in my mouth. My tongue rolled deftly all around it. I sucked it down almost to its very root, feeling it up to any little trick, for it was stiff, hard, and frisky. "'Now,' said I, 'let us enjoy together that pleasure which the gods themselves did not disdain to teach us.' "Thereupon the tips of my fingers stretched the edges of my unexplored little pit to their very utmost. It was gaping to receive the huge instrument that presented itself at the orifice. "He once more pressed the glans upon it; the tiny little lips protruded themselves within the gap; the tip worked its way inside, but the pulpy flesh bulged out all around, and the rod was thus arrested in its career. "'I am afraid I am hurting you?' he asked, 'had we not better leave it for some other time?' "'Oh, no! it is such a happiness to feel your body entering into mine.' "He thrust gently but firmly; the strong muscles of the anus relaxed; the glans was fairly lodged; the skin extended to such a degree that tiny, ruby beads of blood tickled from all around the splitting orifice; still, notwithstanding the way I was torn, the pleasure I felt was much greater than the pain. "He himself was so tightly clasped that he could neither pull his instrument out nor push it in, for when he tried to press it down he felt as if he was being circumcised.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
His lips were on fire, his love seemed to have changed into a raging fever. I don't know what had come over me, but I felt that pleasure could kill, but not calm me. My head was all aglow! "There are two kinds of lascivious feelings, both equally strong and overpowering: the one is the fervent, carnal lust of the senses, enkindled in the genital organs and mounting to the brain, making human beings 'Swim in mirth, and fancy that they feel Divinity within them breeding wings Wherewith to scorn the earth.' The other is the cold libidinousness of fancy, the keen and gall-like irradiation of the brain which parches the healthy blood. "The first, the strong concupiscence of lusty youth— 'as with new wine intoxicated,' natural to the flesh, is satisfied as soon as men take largely 'their fill of love and love's disport,' and the heavily-laden anther has sturdily shaken forth the seed that clogged it; and then they feel as our first parents did, when dewy sleep 'Oppressed them, wearied with their amorous play.' The body.then so delightfully light seems to rest on 'earth's freshest, softest lap,' and the slothful yet half-awakened mind broods over its slumbering shell. "The second, kindled in the head, 'bred of unkindly fumes,' is the lechery of senility—a morbid craving, like the hunger of surfeited gluttony. The senses, like Messalina, 'lassata sed non satiata,' ever tingling, keep hankering after the impossible. The spermatic ejaculations, far from calming the body, only irritate it, for the exciting influence of a salacious fancy continues after the anther has yielded all its seed. Even if acrid blood comes instead of the balmy, cream-like fluid, it brings with it nothing but a painful irritation. If, unlike as in styriasis, an erection does not take place, and the phallus remains limp and lifeless, still the nervous system is no less convulsed by impotent desire and lechery—a mirage of the over-heated brain, no less shattering because it is effete. "These two feelings combined together are something akin to what I underwent as, holding Teleny clasped against my throbbing, heaving breast, I felt within me the contagion of his eager longing and of his overpowering sadness. "I had taken off my friend's shirt collar and cravat to see and to feel his beautiful bare neck, then little by little I stripped him of all his clothes, till at last he remained naked in my embrace. "What a model of voluptuous comeliness he was, with his strong and muscular shoulders, his broad and swelling chest, his skin of a pearly whiteness, as soft and as fresh as the petals of a waterlily, his limbs rounded like those of Leotard, with whom every woman was in love. His thighs, his legs and feet in their exquisite grace, were perfect models.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
"A scuffle ensued again. She was once more locked within my arms and we were wrestling like two prize fighters, with as much eagerness though surely with less skill. She was a muscular little vixen, by no means weak; moreover she had begun to understand the zest which fighting gives to the victory. "It was a real pleasure to feel her body palpitating against mine; and though she was longing to yield, it was only after much ado that I could get my mouth on her's. "With no little difficulty I put her on my bed, and managed to get my head under her skirts. "Women are silly creatures, full of absurd prejudices; and this unsophisticated country wench considered the compliment I was about to pay to her sexual organ as something like buggery. "She called me a dirty beast, a pig, and other such pleasing epithets. She began by writhing and wriggling, and trying to slip away from me, but she thus only added to the pleasure I was giving her. "Finally, she wedged my head between her thighs and pressed the nape of my neck with both her hands, so that even if I had wanted to take my tongue away from her burning lips, I could only have done so with an effort. "I, however, remained there, darting, licking, scraping the little clitoris, till it cried for mercy, and its tears convinced her that this was a pleasure not to be disdained, for this I have found is the only argument with which to convince a woman. "When all the inner parts were thoroughly lubricated by my tongue, and moistened by the soothing overflowings of unbearable pleasure; when she had tasted that ecstatic joy which one virgin can give to another without inflicting any pain or breaking the seal of her innocence, then the sight of her rapture made my own cock crow lustily. I therefore let it out of its dim dungeon, to drive it into the dark den. "My acorn went in merrily, and then it was stopped in its career. Another mighty thrust gave me more pain than pleasure, for the resistance was so great that my ramrod seemed sprained in the action; the narrow and firm walls of the vagina dilated, and my piston was jammed in as though in a tight glove, and yet the hymeneal tissue was not reached. "I asked myself why foolish nature has thus barred the way of pleasure? Is it to make the vain-glorious bridegroom believe that he is the pioneer of the unexplored regions, but does he not know that midwives are always artfully repairing the locks that adulterine keys have opened?
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
But when the now necessary refreshment to me of a glass of wine, and a little eating (all the time observing a profound silence) had somewhat cheered and restored me to spirits, and as the smart began to go off, my good humour returned accordingly: which alteration not escaping him, he said and did every thing that could confirm me in, and indeed exalt it. But scarce was supper well over, before a change so incredible was wrought in me, such violent, yet pleasingly irksome sensations took possession of me that I scarce knew how to contain myself; the smart of the lashes was now converted into such a prickly heat, such fiery tinglings, as made me sigh, squeeze my thighs together, shift and wriggle about my seat, with a furious restlessness; whilst these itching ardours, thus excited in those parts on which the storm of discipline had principally fallen, detached legions of burning, subtile, stimulating spirits, to their opposite spot and centre of assemblage, where their titillation raged so furiously, that I was even stinging made with them. No wonder then that in such a taking, and devoured by flames that licked up all modesty and reserve, my eyes, now charged brimful of the most intense desire, fired on my companion very intelligible signal of distress: my companion, I say, who grew in them every instant more amiable, and more necessary to my urgent wishes and hopes of immediate ease. Mr.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
"'I cannot give you a banquet, although I expected you; still, there is enough to satisfy your hunger, I hope.' "There were some luscious Cancale oysters—few, but of an immense size; a dusty bottle of Sauterne, then a paté de foie gras highly scented with Périgord truffles; a partridge, with paprika or Hungarian curry, and a salad made out of a huge Piedmont truffle, as thinly sliced as shavings, and a bottle of exquisite dry sherry. "All these delicacies were served in dainty blue old Delft and Savona ware, for he had already heard of my hobby for old majolica. "Then came a dish of Seville oranges, bananas, and pineapples, flavoured with Maraschino and covered with sifted sugar. It was a savoury, tasty, tart and sweet medley, combining together the flavour and perfume of all these delicious fruits. "After having washed it down with a bottle of sparkling champagne, we then sipped some tiny cups of fragrant and scalding Mocha coffee; then he lighted a narghilè, or Turkish water pipe, and we puffed at intervals the odorous Latakiah, inhaling it with our ever-hungry kisses from each other's mouths. "The fumes of the smoke and those of the wine rose up to our heads, and in our re-awakened sensuality we soon had between our lips a far more fleshy mouth-piece.than the amber one of the Turkish pipe. "Our heads were again soon lost between each other's thighs. We had once more but one body between us, juggling with one another, ever seeking new caresses, new sensations, a sharper and more inebriating kind of lewdness, in our anxiety not only to enjoy ourselves but to make the other one feel. We were, therefore, very soon the prey of a blasting lust, and only some inarticulate sounds expressed the climax of our voluptuous state, until, more dead than alive, we fell upon each other—a mingled mass of shivering flesh. "After half an hour's rest and a bowl of arrak, curaçoa and whisky punch, flavoured with many hot, invigorating spices, our mouths were again pressed together. "His moist lips grazed mine so very slightly that I hardly felt their touch; they thus only awakened in me the eager desire to feel their contact more closely, whilst the tip of his tongue kept tantalizing mine, darting in my mouth for a second and rapidly slipping out again.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
It must not be supposed that it is a woman's beauty which best stirs a libertine mind, it is rather the species of crime that the law has associated with possession of her: the proof of which is that the more criminal this possession the more one is inflamed by it; the man who enjoys a woman he steals from her husband, a daughter he snatches from her parents, knows a far greater delectation, no doubt of it, than does the husband who enjoys no one but his wife, and the more the ties one breaks appear to be respected, the more the voluptuousness is compounded. If 'tis one's mother, or one's daughter, so many additional charms to the pleasures experienced; when you've savored all this, then you truly would have interdictions further increase in order to give the violation of them added difficulty and greater charm; now, if pleasure-taking is seasoned by a criminal flavoring, crime, dissociated from this pleasure, may become a joy in itself; there will then be a certain delight in naked crime. Well, it is impossible that what contributes the saline tang not itself be very salty. Thus, let me imagine, the abduction of a girl on one's own account will give a very lively pleasure, but abduction in the interests of someone else will give all that pleasure with which the enjoyment of this girl is improved by rape; the theft of a watch, the rape of a purse will also give the same pleasure, and if I have accustomed my senses to being moved by the rape of some girl qua rape, that same pleasure, that same delight will be found again in the seizing of the watch or of the purse, etc.; and that explains the eccentricity in so many honest folk who steal without needing to steal.
From Manhunt (2022)
The spicy musk of their armpit flooded her nostrils as they squirmed underneath her. She pushed her face down into it, lunging across their body to nip at the tender skin and sweat-damp hair. “You taste so fucking good,” she breathed. Feather giggled. The soft, smooth press of their flesh formed a seal around Ramona’s mouth and nose as they squeezed their arms against their sides. She bit down, savoring their squeal of surprise and pain. She pressed the flat of her tongue to their sweaty skin, gripping their wrists as she did. They fought her. She pinned their arms against the rumpled sheets and licked the shivering, tender skin of their armpit. Feather shifted under her. Their little cock pressed hard against her ass cheek. She rose up, hair falling across her face, and grinned at them as they whined, straining against her. “Please?” they whimpered. “Please, daddy.” She ground against them, getting wet, growling low in her throat. “Please what, princess?” “Kiss me.” Ramona dipped low enough to graze their softly pointed chin with her lips, then pulled away with a mocking laugh when they lunged at her, mouth open. She curled her lower lip, letting saliva gather between it and her gums, letting the resultant loogie dribble from her mouth to dangle glistening over Feather’s face. She pushed her tongue against her lip and let the rope of cloudy sputum fall. It struck just above their parted lips and dripped into the dark, wet cavern of their mouth. Feather shivered with delight, their hands curling into trembling fists where they lay pinned to the threadbare sheets. She dug her nails into their wrists, grinding harder, smearing wetness on their cock, their belly, the sweaty stretch of skin between them with its thicket of pale reddish curls. Her high was coming on in earnest now, washing her brain in a cool fizz of dissociative release. Her limbs felt loose and clean and weightless. I’m dirty. “You’re a dirty girl,” she murmured into Feather’s ear, and she ran her tongue along the ridges of pliant cartilage— pinnea, concha, helix, antihelix , she heard in her bio teacher Mr. da Costa’s voice, which made her snicker—probing at the mouth of the canal. She bit their earlobe, hard, and relished the sudden tensing of their body under hers. She growled again, low and slow and lazy this time. They let out a piteous whine that was equal parts frightened and horny, a pre-tantrum snivel that sent a filthy thrill of arousal up through Ramona’s stomach. “Kiss me, kiss me, daddy.”
From Mud Vein (2014)
You don’t have to be alone. We are mostly born that way, though. We grow up being nurtured to believe that the other half of our soul is somewhere out there. And since there are six billion people inhabiting our planet, chances are one of them is for you. To find that person, to find your soul-piece, or your great love, we must count on our paths diverging, the tangling of lives, the soft whispering of one soul recognizing another. I found my piece. She wasn’t what I was expecting. If you formed a woman’s soul out of black graphite, bathed it in blood, and then rolled it around in the softest rose petals, you still wouldn’t have touched on the complication that was my match. I met her on the last day of summer. It felt appropriate that I would meet a daughter of winter as the last of the Washington sunshine sieved through the sky. Next week there would be rain, rain and more rain. But today, there was sun, and she stood underneath it, squinting even beneath her sunglasses as if she were allergic to the light. I was walking my dog through a busy park on Lake Washington. We’d just turned around to head home when I stopped to look at her. She was lean—a runner, probably. And she was wearing one of those things that’s longer than a sweater and shorter than a dress. A sweater dress? I followed the line of her legs to camo boots. You could tell she loved those shoes by the worn creases and the way she stood so comfortably in them. I loved those boots for her. And on her. I wanted to be in her. A rough manly thought I’d be too ashamed to admit out loud. The straps of a messenger bag crossed over her chest and hung at her left thigh. Now, I consider myself a bold man, but not quite bold enough to approach a woman whose every body movement said she wanted to be left alone. I did that day. And the closer I got, the stranger she became. She didn’t see me; she was too busy looking at the water. Lost in it a little. How can a man be jealous of water? That’s exactly what I wanted to explore. “Hi,” I said, when I was standing in front of her. She didn’t raise her eyes right away. When she did, her look was a little indolent. I jumped right in. “I’m a writer, and when I saw you standing here, I was compelled to start putting words down on paper. Which makes me think you’re my muse. Which makes me think I need to talk to you.” She smiled at me. It looked like it took effort, that perhaps maybe she didn’t smile very often and her facial muscles were stiff. “That’s the best pickup line I’ve ever heard,” she mused.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
I had from childhood a hankering for males of the prizefighter's type, with huge limbs, rippling muscles, mighty thews; for brutal strength in fact. "My first infatuation was for a young Hercules of a butcher, who came a-courting our maid—a pretty girl, as far as I can remember. He was a stout athletic fellow with sinewy arms, who looked as if he could have felled an ox with a blow of his fist. "I often used to sit and watch him unawares, noting every expression of his face whilst he was making love, almost feeling the lust he felt himself. "How I did wish he would speak to me instead of joking with my stupid maid. I felt jealous of her although I liked her very much. Sometimes he used to take me up and fondle me, but that was very seldom; one day, however, when—apparently excited—he had tried hard to kiss her, and had not succeeded, he took me up and greedily pressed his lips against mine, kissing me as if he were parched with thirst. "Although I was but a very little child, still I think this act must have brought about an erection, for I remember every pulse of mine was fluttering. I still remember the pleasure I felt when—like a cat—I could rub myself against his legs, nestle between his thighs, sniff him like a dog, or pat and paddle him; but, alas! he seldom heeded me. "My greatest delight in my boyhood was to see men bathing. I could hardly keep myself from rushing up to them; I should have liked to handle and kiss them all over. I was quite beyond myself when I saw one of them naked. "A phallus acted upon me, as—I suppose—it does upon a very hot woman; my mouth actually watered at its sight, especially if it was a good-sized, full-blooded one, with an unhooded thick and fleshy glans. "Withal, I never understood that I loved men and not women. What I felt was that convulsion of the brain that kindles the eyes with a fire full of madness, an eager bestial delight, a fierce sensual desire. Love I thought was a quiet chaffy drawing-room flirtation, something soft, maudlin and æsthetic, quite different from that passion full of rage and hatred which was burning within me. In a word, much more of a sedative than an aphrodisiac.' "Then I suppose you had never had a woman?" "Oh, yes! several; though by chance, rather than by choice. Nevertheless, for a Frenchman of my age, I had begun life rather late.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
"'What! drowned yourself?' "'No, not exactly: the river is too cold and bleak, I am too much of a Sybarite for that. No, I should simply have put myself to sleep—the eternal slumber of death, dreaming of you, in this room prepared to receive you, and where no man has ever set his foot.' "Saying these words he opened the door of a small chamber, and ushered me into it. A strong, overpowering smell of white heliotrope first greeted my nostrils. "It was a most peculiar room, the walls of which were covered over with some warm, white, soft, quilted stuff, studded all over with frosted silver buttons; the floor was covered with the curly white fleece of young lambs; in the middle of the apartment stood a capacious couch, on which was thrown the skin of a huge polar bear. Over this single piece of furniture, an old silver lamp—evidently from some Byzantine church or some Eastern synagogue—-shed a pale glimmering light, sufficient, however, to light up the dazzling whiteness of this temple of Priapus whose votaries we were. "'I know,' said he, as he dragged me in, 'I know that white is your favourite colour, that it suits your dark complexion, so it has been fitted up for you and you alone. No other mortal shall ever set his foot in it.' "Uttering these words, he in a trice stripped me deftly of all my clothes—for I was in his hands like a slumbering child, or a man in a trance. "In an instant I was not only stark naked, but stretched on the bear-skin, whilst he, standing in front of me, was gloating upon me with famished eyes. "I felt his glances greedily fall everywhere; they sank in my brain, and my head began to swim; they pierced through my heart, whipping my blood up, making it flow quicker and hotter through all the arteries; they darted within my veins, and Priapus unhooded itself and lifted up its head violently so that all the tangled web of veins in its body seemed ready to burst. "Then he felt me with his hands everywhere, after which he began to press his lips on every part of my body, showering kisses on my breast, my arms, my legs, my thighs, and then, when he had reached my middle parts, he pressed his face rapturously on the thick and curly hair that grows there so plentifully. "He shivered with delight as he felt the crisp locks upon his cheek and neck; then, taking hold of my phallus, he pressed his lips upon it. That seemed to electrify him; and then the tip and afterwards the whole glans disappeared within his mouth. "As it did so, I could hardly keep quiet.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
"For all answer I pressed his fingers tightly. "'I never knew a man whose feelings coincided so well with mine. Tell me, do you think any woman could feel so intensely?' "My head sank down, I could not give him any answer. "'We shall be friends?' said he, taking hold of both my hands. "'Yes,' said I shyly. "'Yes, but great friends, bosom friends, as the English say.' "'Yes.' "Thereupon he clasped me again to his breast and muttered in my ear some words of an unknown tongue, so low and musical, that they almost seemed like a spell. "'Do you know what that means?' quoth he. "'No.' "'Oh, friend! my heart doth yearn for thee." CHAPTER II " T HAT whole night I was excited and feverish, I tossed about on my bed unable to find any rest; and when at last I fell asleep it was only to be haunted by the most lascivious and erotic dreams. "Once, for instance, it seemed to me that Teleny was not a man, but a woman; moreover, he was my own sister. "'But you never had a sister, had you?' "'No, of course not. Some day I shall tell you the reason why I am an only son. In this hallucination, I—like Amon the son of David,—loved my sister, and I was so vexed that I fell sick, for I thought it not only hard—but a most heinous act—to do something to her. I therefore struggled hard to crush my love; but one night, unable to overcome the maddening passion that was consuming me, I yielded to it and stealthily crept into her room. "By the rosy light of her night-lamp, I saw her lying, or rather, stretched across her bed. I shivered with lust at the sight of that pearly-white flesh. I should have liked to have been a beast of prey to devour it. "Her loose and dishevelled golden hair was scattered in locks all over the pillow. Her lawn chemise scarcely veiled part of her nakedness, whilst it enhanced the beauty of what was left bare. The ribbons with which this garment had been tied on her shoulder had come undone, and thus exhibited her right breast to my hungry, greedy glances. It stood up firm and plump, for she was a very young virgin, and its dainty shape was no bigger than a large-sized champagne bowl, and as Symonds says: "Her breasts shone like pinks that lilies wreath." As her right arm was uplifted and bent under her head, I could see a bushy mass of dark auburn hair under her arm-pit. She was lying in the enticing position of Danaë at the moment when she was deflowered by Jupiter in the shape of a golden shower; that is, her knees were drawn up, and her thighs widely apart.
From The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (2007)
“Kid, if you get my daughter pregnant, if you make some charcoal babies, I’m going to disown her. I’m going to kick her out of my house and you’ll have to bring her home to your mommy and daddy. You hearing me straight, kid? This is all on you now.” [image "A cartoon drawing of a character named Earl, depicted as a slimy creature with a face, exclaiming ‘BLEEEATUPGH!’ and a label stating ‘Number 1 candidate for the Father-of-the-Year Award.’" file=image_rsrc4SM.jpg] Yep, Earl was a real winner. Okay, so Penelope and I became the hot topic because we were defying the great and powerful Earl. And, yeah, you’re probably thinking that Penelope was dating me ONLY because I was the worst possible choice for her. She was probably dating me ONLY because I was an Indian boy. And, okay, so she was only semi-dating me. We held hands once in a while and we kissed once or twice, but that was it. I don’t know what I meant to her. I think she was bored of being the prettiest, smartest, and most popular girl in the world. She wanted to get a little crazy, you know? She wanted to get a little smudged. And I was the smudge. But, hey, I was kind of using her, too. After all, I suddenly became popular. Because Penelope had publicly declared that I was cute enough to ALMOST date, all of the other girls in school decided that I was cute, too. Because I got to hold hands with Penelope, and kiss her good-bye when she jumped on the school bus to go home, all of the other boys in school decided that I was a major stud. Even the teachers started paying more attention to me. I was mysterious. How did I, the dorky Indian guy, win a tiny piece of Penelope’s heart? What was my secret? I looked and talked and dreamed and walked differently than everybody else. I was new. If you want to get all biological, then you’d have to say that I was an exciting addition to the Reardan gene pool. So, okay, those are all the obvious reasons why Penelope and I were friends. All the shallow reasons. But what about the bigger and better reasons? “Arnold,” she said one day after school, “I hate this little town. It’s so small, too small. Everything about it is small. The people here have small ideas. Small dreams. They all want to marry each other and live here forever.” “What do you want to do?” I asked. “I want to leave as soon as I can. I think I was born with a suitcase.” Yeah, she talked like that. All big and goofy and dramatic. I wanted to make fun of her, but she was so earnest. “Where do you want to go?” I asked.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
This continuation of that grateful stricture which is in us, to the men, the very jet of their pleasure, I owed, it seems, to a happy habit of body, juicy, plump and furnished, towards the texture of those parts, with a fullness of soft springy flesh, that yielding sufficiently, as it does, to almost any distension soon recovers itself so as to re-tighten that strict compression of its mantlings and folds, which form the sides of the passage, wherewith it so tenderly embraces and closely clips any foreign body introduced into it, such as my exploring finger then was. Finding then every thing in due tone and order, I remember my fears, only to make a jest of them to myself. And now, palpably mistress of any size of man, and triumphing in my double achievement of pleasure and revenge, I abandoned myself entirely to the ideas of all the delight I had swam in. I lay stretching out, glowingly alive all over, and tossing with burning impatience for the renewal of joys that had sinned but in a sweet excess; nor did I lose my longing, for about ten in the morning, according to expectation, Will, my new humble sweetheart, came with a message from his master, Mr. H...., to know how I did. I had taken care to send my maid on an errand into the city, that I was sure would take up time enough; and, from the people of the house, I had nothing to fear, as they were plain good sort of folks, and wise enough to mind no more other people’s business than they could well help. All dispositions then made, not forgetting that of lying in bed to receive him, when he was entered the door of my bed chamber, a latch, that I governed by a wire, descended and secured it. I could not but observe that my young minion was as much spruced out as could be expected from one in his condition: a desire of pleasing that could not be indifferent to me, since it proved that I pleased him; which, I assure you, was now a point I was not above having in view.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
"'Is it enough for you?' said he, almost superciliously. "She pressed her lips again upon his, and almost relinquished her grasp. The hand went stealthily up along the leg, stopped a moment on the knees, caressing them; but the legs closely pressed together prevented it from slipping between them, and thus reaching the higher storey. It crept slowly up, nevertheless, caressing the thighs through the fine linen underclothing, and thus, by stolen marches, it reached its aim. The hand then slipped between the opening of the drawers, and began to feel the soft skin. She tried to stop him. "'No, no!' said she; 'please dont; you are tickling me.' "He then took courage, and plunged his fingers boldly in the fine curly locks of the fleece that covered all her middle parts. "She continued to hold her thighs tightly closed together, especially when the naughty fingers began to graze the edge of the moist lips. At that touch, however, her strength gave way; the nerves relaxed, and allowed the tip of a finger to worm its way within the slit—nay, the tiny berry protruded out to welcome it. "After a few moments she breathed more strongly. She encircled his breast with her arms, kissed him, and then hid her head on his shoulder. "'Oh, what a rapture I feel!' she cried. 'What a magnetic fluid you possess to make me feel I as do!' "He did not give her any answer; but, unbuttoning his trousers, he took hold of her dainty little hand. He endeavoured to introduce it within the gap. She tried to resist, but weakly, and as if asking but to yield. She soon gave way, and boldly caught hold of his phallus, now stiff and hard, moving lustily by its own inward strength. "After a few moments of pleasant manipulation, their lips pressed together, he lightly, and almost against her knowledge, pressed her down on the couch, lifted up her legs, pulled up her skirts without for a moment taking his tongue out of her mouth or stopping his tickling of her tingling clitoris already wet with its own tears. Then—sustaining his weight on his elbows—he got his legs between her thighs.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
It was a longing of the senses, and a mad intoxication of the brain. "Could this burning, unquenchable fire that consumed our bodies be called lust? We clung as hungrily to one another as the famished animal does when it fastens on the food it devours; and as we kissed each other with ever-increasing greed, my fingers were feeling his curly hair, or paddling the soft skin of his neck. Our legs being clasped together, his phallus, in strong erection, was rubbing against mine no less stiff and stark. We were, however, always shifting our position, so as to get every part of our bodies in as close a contact as possible; and thus feeling, clasping, hugging, kissing, and biting each other, we must have looked, on that bridge amidst the thickening fog, like two damned souls suffering eternal torment. "The hand of Time had stopped; and I think we should have continued goading each other in our mad desire until we had quite lost our senses—for we were both on the verge of madness—had we not been stopped by a trifling incident. "A belated cab—wearied with the day's toil—was slowly trudging its way homeward. The driver was sleeping on his box; the poor, broken-down jade, with its head drooping almost between its knees, was likewise slumbering—dreaming, perhaps, of unbroken rest, of new-mown hay, of the fresh and flowery pastures of its youth; even the slow rumbling of the wheels had a sleepy, purring, snoring sound in its irksome sameness. "'Come home with me,' said Teleny, in a low, nervous, and trembling voice; 'come and sleep with me,' added he, in the soft, hushed, and pleading tone of the lover who would fain be understood without words. "I pressed his hands for all answer. "'Will you come?' "' Yes,' I whispered, almost inaudibly. "This low, hardly-articulate sound was the hot breath of vehement desire; this lisped monosyllable was the willing consent to his eagerest wish. "Then he hailed the passing cab, but it was some moments before the driver could be awakened and made to understand what we wanted of him. "As I stepped in the vehicle, my first thought was that in a few minutes Teleny would belong to me. This thought acted upon my nerves as an electric current, making me shiver from head to foot. "My lips had to articulate the words, 'Teleny will be mine,' for me to believe it. He seemed to hear the noiseless movement of my lips, for he clasped my head between his hands, and kissed me again and again. "Then, as if feeling a pang of remorse,—'You do not repent, do you?' he asked. "'How can I?' "'And you will be mine—mine alone?' "'I never was any other man's, nor ever shall be.' "'You will love me for ever?' "'And ever.'
From Mud Vein (2014)
And she was wearing one of those things that’s longer than a sweater and shorter than a dress. A sweater dress? I followed the line of her legs to camo boots. You could tell she loved those shoes by the worn creases and the way she stood so comfortably in them. I loved those boots for her. And on her. I wanted to be in her. A rough manly thought I’d be too ashamed to admit out loud. The straps of a messenger bag crossed over her chest and hung at her left thigh. Now, I consider myself a bold man, but not quite bold enough to approach a woman whose every body movement said she wanted to be left alone. I did that day. And the closer I got, the stranger she became. She didn’t see me; she was too busy looking at the water. Lost in it a little. How can a man be jealous of water? That’s exactly what I wanted to explore. “Hi,” I said, when I was standing in front of her. She didn’t raise her eyes right away. When she did, her look was a little indolent. I jumped right in. “I’m a writer, and when I saw you standing here, I was compelled to start putting words down on paper. Which makes me think you’re my muse. Which makes me think I need to talk to you.” She smiled at me. It looked like it took effort, that perhaps maybe she didn’t smile very often and her facial muscles were stiff. “That’s the best pickup line I’ve ever heard,” she mused. I wasn’t sure if it was a pickup line. It was embarrassingly truthful. Just saying it made my lips pucker like I was holding in a mouthful of lemon pulp. I eyed the worn leather messenger bag at her hip. “What’s in the bag?” I asked. I was starting to get a feeling about her. Like I knew what she was before she told me. “A computer.” I didn’t peg her as a college student. She had too much attitude to be a professional. Self-employed, I was guessing. “You’re a writer, too,” I said. She nodded. “So we speak the same language,” I offered. She had a strip of silver running through her brown hair. More proof, it seemed, that she was born for winter. “You’re John Karde,” she said. “I’ve seen your picture. In Barnes and Noble.” “Well, that’s embarrassing.” “Only if I don’t like sappy women’s fiction,” she said. “Which I do.” “Do you write it?” She shook her head, and I swear that sliver of silver glimmered in the dying sun. My nerdy writer mind immediately said mithril. “I’m working on my first real novel. It feels pretty angry.” “Let’s talk about it over dinner,” I offered.
From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)
When one arrives at this stage, one merely complains of the mediocrity of the means: the more encompassing their atrociousness, the more piquant our joy becomes, and thus one sinks in the quagmire without the slightest desire to emerge. "That, Therese, is my own history: two young children are necessary for my daily sacrifices; having once enjoyed them, - not only do I never again set eyes upon these objects, but it even becomes essential to my fantasies' entire satisfaction that they instantly leave the city: I should not at all savor the following day's pleasures were I to imagine that yesterday's victims still breathed the same air I inhale; the method for being rid of them is not complicated. Would you believe it, Therese? They are my debauches which populate Languedoc and Provence with the multitude of objects of libertinage with which those regions are teeming: (Let this not be mistaken for a fable: this wretched figure existed in this same Lyon. What is herein related of his maneuvers is exact and authentic: he cost the honor of between fifteen and twenty thousand unhappy little creatures: upon the completion of each operation, the victim was embarked on the Rhone, and for thirty years the above-mentioned cities were peopled with the objects of this villain's debauchery, with girls undone by him. There is nothing fictitious about this episode but the gentleman's name.) ...one hour after these little girls have served me, reliable emissaries pack them off and sell them to the matchmakers of Montpellier, Toulouse, Nimes, Aix, and Marseilles: this trade, two-thirds of whose net profits go to me, amply recompenses the outlay required to procure my subjects, and thus I satisfy two of my most cherished passions, lust and greed; but reconnoitering and seduction are bothersome. Furthermore, the kind of subject is of infinite importance to my lubricity: I must have them all procured from those asylums of misery where the need to live and the impossibility of managing to do so eat away courage, pride, delicacy, finally rot the soul, and, in the hope of an indispensable subsistence, steel a person to undertake whatever appears likely to provide it. I have all these nests ransacked, all these dungheaps combed pitilessly: you've no idea what they yield; I would even go further, Therese: I say that civil activity, industry, a little social ease would defeat my subornations and divest me of a great proportion of my subjects: I combat these perils with the influence I enjoy in this city, I promote commercial and economic fluctuations or instigate the rise of prices which, enlarging the poverty-stricken class, depriving it, on the one hand, of possibilities of work and on the other rendering difficult those of survival, increases according to a predictable ratio the total number of the subjects misery puts into my clutches.