This is a wonderfully erotic photo. What I love about this photo is that more is left to the imagination than not. This is what I would call true erotica. Her sensuality, her sexuality is obvious, yet there is also that alluring barrier present; we need to use our imaginations to wonder what lies hidden beneath those clothes, we need to make an effort. Just as in life we need to make an effort to seduce a woman, to finally uncover what lies beneath her clothes, what lies inside of her, to feel yourself inside of her, so too in this photo a bit of effort is required on our part. We are drawn fully into her sexuality, yet we are also denied what we want, which is too see her naked, and, even more, to possess he sexually, to enjoy the sensuality flowing from her. We only get a hint of her full beauty: her disheveled, luxuriant hair, her soft bedroom eyes, her full and delightful breasts, so obviously sensitive to us, her simple white panties delicately concealing her most treasured and desired regions. In many ways it is more true to the real life experiences of eroticism than the artificial explicitness of most porn. There is beauty, sensuality, sexuality all wonderfully mixed together, yet in not revealing all, in keeping back some of the more desired sights, we succumb to the power of feminine sexuality. This is what eroticism for men is so often like, we want, but we cannot have. We feel the heat of desire, we are beckoned to feed the flames of our lust, but we are unable to fully quench and consume those flames, and so we are left wanting more. Every man who has seen a beautiful woman walking down the street knows this feeling. Every man who has longed after a girl he cannot quite have knows his helpless submission to this terrible yet intoxicating power of female sexuality. And every woman who knows her sexuality knows the power she has over men.

It is images like this that remind us of the ancient goddesses of fertility, the Aphrodites and Venuses that all cultures and civilizations from time immemorial have worshiped, who were the embodiment of the raw power of female sexuality. But unlike today’s world where all sexuality has become everything but a sacred thing, in the past those goddesses had to be worshiped, they had to be approached, appeased, respected and even feared. There was a sense of the sacred to sexuality. The ancients understood the explosive power of sexuality that many of us in our bland and crass world have all but forgotten: the mystery, beauty and joy of deep and abiding sensuality, eroticism, sexuality, and of course, love. They were feared, respected, honored as basic forces of the natural world. Somehow, at least for me, this image stirs those same reactions. Our modern world, a world which routinely produces porn videos which such titles as “Teenage Anal Destruction”, has lost all sense of the sacred when it comes to sex. I feel sad to be living in such a world, but happy to reject these more unpleasant elements of it as well. Yeah, I am a sexual snob, I suppose. I like my sexual pleasure high class.

Sexuality is powerful, but it is still a game, it is part of Game, and yet it is a wonderful game. What would life be without these sexual tensions and desires? What would life be without the delicate dance of longing, desire, and approach enacted by men and women. Just as the old goddesses existed for millennia, so too have the eternal struggles between men and women over sex, sensuality and love. Eroticism, despite the best efforts of the more puritan elements of different societies, whether they be the Taliban or the rigidly religious nut cases of the Western world (from the Jansenists to the Legionaries of Christ), is a force that cannot, nor should not be ignored in our lives, especially by a specious and frivolous intellectualization of fleshly desires. Every man with the power of imagination can only imagine, and is left only to imagine, yet not without the intense heat of eroticism and even lust, what it would be like to enjoy the deepest and fullest sexual and sensual pleasures with a beautiful creature such as this.

Did God not create beauty? Did God not create this? Did God not create those desire in us that respond to this? But wait, I can hear the anal retentive, repressed theologian, or the pious member of Church who views and experiences all life through the abstract prism of laws, rules and regulations, say in his highly controlled and whiny voice, “Yes, God did create this, but this an example of something disordered, because of original sin, and your looking at this is disordered too. It is gravely and intrinsically disordered! It is dirty and filthy! She is obviously a slut and you are going to hell for looking at her!” My response would be, “Well, pretend she is your wife. Is wanting to fuck her disordered then? Oh yeah, I forgot, the Pope told us we should not lust after our wives.” Then I might say to my imaginary wife, the one in the photo, “ Ok then, honey, in order for us to enjoy pure, unsullied sex, I will put a bag over your face, place a sheet between us, cut a hole in it, and then we can copulate for the sole purpose of procreation without me feeling any sexual desires for you. Then we know our sex is pure. But wait, how about this? Instead of using bed sheets with holes in them (and some religious groups in the world do actually this), how about if we just become furries and do it that way. You do know what a furry, is, don’t you? I have heard of furry sex. I doubt the Church has any theological explanation or condemnation of furries, yet. That means we are good to go, at least until furry fucking is defined legalistically into a sin.” Any wife would probably divorce her husband after such a suggestion, because, as most women know and as most clergy don’t know, women actually enjoy being lusted after. The loudest laughs about the Pope’s statement on not lusting after your wife came not from men, but from women. I love John Paul II, and he did great and important things, but on some issue he was a bit too flaky.

But I digress…back to this lovely photo. I love looking at this. It is incredibly hot. I also think it is good enough to be called art. And like all good art, I could never tire of viewing this photo.