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Posts Tagged ‘“A Seasoning of Lust”’

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‘A Fortunate Fate’, a Japanese inspired short story.

February 13, 2018

Geisha picture 2016

A FORTUNATE FATE

 

Hana Takate was nineteen years old, a courtesan in old Edo. When she appeared in public, men’s eyes turned like sunflowers to her sun.

Lovely Hana had bones like melted butter and skin shaped from powder. She was a creature so luminous a flower of purest jade could not compare. When she rose from a nap, wearing a simple gauze robe, free of makeup and perfumes, she floated like a spider’s web. A vision of culture and desire, her laugh was a tinkling bell, her hair of bo silk, and her movements like cool water.

One day during cherry blossom time, she was entertaining, her robes folded open like gossamer wings, her rouged nipples suckled by another. A young daimyo was admitted to her rooms by mistake. This new lover was so angered he cut off the head of his rival with his katana in one swift blow.

Hana knelt before him, head down, exposing her swan neck, awaiting death. Seeing her trembling fragility, her obedient meekness, he could not take her life and disappeared to write some bad verse.

She became known as “The Immortal Flower”, a courtesan of first rank. She prospered and became fat.

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2017, “A Fortunate Fate” is from the second edition of “A Seasoning of Lust”, Amazon.com, 2016

revised-cover-2776

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“Olsen’s Pond”…..

January 1, 2018

mignot-winter-skating-scene

 I start out the New Year with this poem for many personal reasons.  Some have found it too ‘hard’ to read for their own reasons.  And some have read it and found their own childhood in it.  Regardless, it remains my favorite poem.

Lady Nyo

–

Returning to the old house,

now still, vacant,

staring with unshaded eyes

upon a snowy front garden,

shrubs overgrown with the

lustiness of summer

now split to the ground

taxed with a heavy snow.

 

I tried to light the parlor stove,

cranky old smoker

clanking and rattling

in the best of times

now given up the ghost,

cold metal unyielding to wadded paper

and an old mouse nest.

 

Now the silence of the rooms

broken by hissing wind

whipping around  eaves

rattling old bones in the attic,

stirring the haunts asleep in  corners.

 

It took time for twigs to catch

water turn to coffee

bacon, eggs brought from the city

cooked in an old iron skillet–

tasting far better in the country air.

 

I looked down at hands cracked

in the brittle winter light,

moisture gone,

hair static with electricity,

feet numb from the cold

the woodstove not giving

more heat than an ice cube.

 

Walking down to Olsen’s pond,

Looking through the glassine surface

remembering the boy who had fallen

through while playing hockey

slipping under thin ice,

disappearing without a sound,

only noticed when our puck flew

high in the air

and he, the guard, missing.

 

We skated to the edge, threw bodies flat

trying to catch him just out of reach,

crying like babies, snot running down chins,

knowing he was floating just under the ice–

silenced like the lamb he was.

 

Childhood ended that day.

We drifted away to the city,

our skates and sticks put up,

Olsen’s pond deserted like a haunted minefield.

 

Fifty years ago I still remember

stretched as far as I could

belly freezing on treacherous ice,

grasping to reach a life just out of sight,

his muffler and stick floating to the surface–

The boy, the important part,

gone for good from a chilly winter’s play.

 

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2017

revised-cover-2776

 “Olsen’s Pond” was published in “A Seasoning of Lust”, 2016, Amazon.com

 

 

 

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December 30, 2017

Moon dec 30, 2017

(taken tonight, December 30th, 2017, looking East)

 

The full moon above

floats on blackened velvet sea-

poet’s perfection!

But who does not yearn for a

crescent in lavender sky?

–

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2017

–

(“Moon” originally appeared in “A Seasoning of Lust”, 2sd edition,  2016, Amazon.com)

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“Some New Poems”…..Perhaps some tanka.

December 28, 2017

revised-cover-2776

(Just a year ago, I published “A Seasoning of Lust”, second edition, at Amazon.com)

–

How could I forget

The beauty of the pale moon!

A face of sorrow

Growing thin upon the tide

A face of desperation.

–

crescent-moon

Shooting star crosses

Upended bowl of deep night

Imagination

Fires with excited gaze.

A moment– and all is gone.

–

Rain and moon tonight

Creates a confusion

Moon hides behind clouds

Fleeting clouds filter the rain

Moon appears, shoots silver darts.

–

When I saw your head

Upon the pillow we shared

Was this forever?

I am left with a pillow

That holds a ghost in the down.

–

Autumn wind startles–

Lowered to an ominous

Key—Ah! Mournful sounds!

The fat mountain deer listen-

Add their bellowing sorrow.

–

The moon floats on wisps

Of clouds extending outward

Tendrils of white fire

Blanketing the universe

Gauzy ghosts of nothingness.

—

-Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2017 (some of these poems were published in “A Seasoning of Lust”, Amazon.com, 2016

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“Mlle Duchamps”….from the new edition of “A Seasoning of Lust”.

November 3, 2017

Image result for young 18th century women

 

I am putting together a collection of short stories for publication next year.  This is one of them.  I had wanted to post this around Halloween, but missed the date.  Don’t read if you are perturbed by vampires or lesbianism.

Lady Nyo

—

Many years ago there was an elderly gentleman who lived  with his invalid daughter Marie, in the Vercors region of France, near the Swiss Alps. Comte d’Epinay was impoverished, due to the death of so many relatives by Madame Guillotine, and the taxation upon those of the aristocracy who managed to keep their heads.

For a while  Comte d’Epinay was addressed as “Citizen d’Epinay”, but the country folk reverted to M d’Epinay, and an uneasy peace existed.  M d’Epinay lived without the luxuries of his youth in a decaying house, too small to be considered a chateau and too large for economy.  The roofs leaked, the fireplaces could benefit from a good cleaning, but beyond a shotgun blast up the chimneys every few years, there was little improvement in the draw. The tiles tumbled off the roofs with the Mistral, which swept down the Alps and did much damage.  It was locally held that anyone who went mad with the sounds of the wind would be pardoned of their crimes.

The household staff had dwindled to a housekeeper and a steward, M and Mme Pennay, leftovers from the ancien re’gime along with Mme Fournard, who was the governess for Marie d’Epiney.  Social visits had diminished in the early years after the Terror, even this far removed from Paris.  Gone were the parties and fetes of M d’Epinay’s early marriage, and gone was his wife.  She had grown feeble with each packet of news from the capitol, and finally one morning, was found stiff and cold in her bed.  It was said Madame had died of grief for her beloved France.  The locals thought otherwise, but as isolated people do, they believed evil had blown down from the mountains and played a hand in all misfortunes in the countryside.

This part of France was prey to all kinds of superstition and haunts.  If a cow stopped giving her rich milk and gave a watery stream, it was the hand of a witch.  If a flock of chickens started eating their eggs, it was because a malevolent spirit haunted a farmer’s house.

The spring came early and with it the rains.  Each day, Marie d’Epinay would limp her way around the bedroom, and holding onto the chairs and sofa, she would make her way slowly to the big window that gave her the outside world. Mlle d’Epinay’s governess had grown to be a companion, for her charge was now in her twenties. Mme Fournard was herself almost elderly, a woman whose life had passed her by in the service of the d’Epinay child.

“ Marie!”  Mme Fournard had come into the room and saw her charge leaning on the windowsill, staring out at the pouring rain. “Marie, come away from the window, ma cherie.  The cold from this rain will make you sick.”

Marie’s usual thought passed across her mind when Mme started her scolding.  “How much sicker will I become before death takes me away?”  But this of course she did not impart to her governess.  Mme Fournard was deeply religious, or superstitious, and to Marie’s thinking, there was little difference.  Perhaps it was the loneliness of her days spent in dank rooms with a book in hand that created such cynicism in Mlle.

One late afternoon, in a heavy downpour, there was a long knocking at the door.  The housekeeper, grumbling at the impatience of the knocker, hurried to answer.  A man was standing there on the steps with water running off his hat, and in his arms a bundle. Without a word, the man entered. The housekeeper, of course, would not deny him entrance in such weather.

“Thank you, Madame.  We have been traveling from the east and our carriage has overturned on the road. Mlle Duchamp has been injured and your house was the only one I could see in this rain.  Please forgive the intrusion.”

The knocking drew the household, M d’Epinay amongst them.  “Mme Fournard, please help Mme Pennay, take this young woman to a bed.” M d’Epinay was a gracious soul. His own lack of fortune would never turn his heart cold to the distressed.

When Mlle Duchamp was deposited in a bed, and the man had withdrawn to the warm kitchen, Mme Fournard opened the blanket and saw an almost lifeless young woman.  She had drab red hair, made worse by the rain, such pale skin that there was no bloom of life, and a breast that barely rose.  Stripping her garments, the two women noticed she had  signs of extreme malnourishment. Her ribs stuck out painfully and her skin was translucent.   She appeared to be in her twenties, but she could have been older.  It was impossible to tell due to her present condition.

Over the course of a few days Mlle Duchamp regained consciousness but remained very weak regardless good broth and simples applied to her lips.  The man who had brought her went out in the pouring rain and was never seen again.  No trace of a carriage was found later on the road, for M.d’Epinay sent men out to help put things to right.

Mlle d’Epinay heard from her governess of the guest in the next bedroom.  She was curious to see the girl. She had a key to the adjoining bedroom, and when Mme Fournard was down in the kitchen or somewhere in the house, she would unlock the door between the rooms and would make her way slowly into the bedroom, lurching from chair to table, and finally to the bedside.  Usually the woman was asleep, muttering in a deep dream. Today she was awake but motionless.

“You are finally awake! Bon!  I am Marie d’Epinay, this is my father’s house.  I am glad to see that you have recovered.”

The young woman before her struggled to focus her eyes and a small smile formed on her lips.

“I am so cold, Mlle. I am so cold.  Come to me and keep me warm.”

Marie did not see any reason to refuse this poor woman, and went down beside her, over the top of the blankets.  She gingerly put her arms around the woman and felt the bones of her shoulders.  Louise Duchamp, for that was her Christian name, sighed sweetly, and the two of them fell into sleep.  They awoke later that afternoon, both refreshed and talking and this is how Mme Fournard found them, when she came with a tray for Mlle Duchamp.

It was true the house was cold and damp, and remained that way until the heat of the summer, so Mme Fournard did not have any immediate objection to the two young women taking a nap together.  She had a servant stoke up the fire and propped upon pillows, both women would read aloud to each other, and both sets of cheeks seemed to color with some health.

Marie would sleep in her own room during the night, but insisted Mme Fournard leave the adjoining door open so she could hear the sighs of her now dear Louise.

One night Marie awoke in the darkness and gasped in fright.  It was only Louise standing there over her, as if sleepwalking.  Pulling back the covers Marie beckoned for Louise to join her, for the spring was a long and wet one and the rooms still damp.  Louise lay down on her pillow, wrapping her arms around Marie.  She drew her close, and kissed her shoulder, travelling with little kisses down the virginal breast of Marie.  At first Marie stiffened in her arms, then relaxed, for surely Louise was dreaming and could not know what she was doing. Louise found a soft nipple through Marie’s nightgown and started to suckle her.  Marie, surprised, felt a tremor travel from her breast down her body. She gave a little moan and Louise smiled, stopped and fell back asleep.

After that, Louise would visit Marie and when the stillness of the house was complete and nothing disturbed the absolute silence except the moaning of the wind outside, she would fasten her lips upon Marie’s breast.  She would suck and nibble, and Marie would moan.  When Marie awoke in the morning, Louise was asleep in her own bed, the roses in her cheeks showing her recovery.  Marie remembered nothing unusual, except a strange, continuing dream that left her languid far into the morning.

The visits continued for several weeks. One night, Marie found Louise beside her, and this time, Louise had bunched up the muslin of her nightgown.  Slowly, almost like a moth’s gentle touch, Marie felt her fingers.  She stroked back and forth, back and forth, barely touching the flesh.  But for Marie, it felt like an angel’s wing to her, and she experienced a sensation that had her hips arch off the mattress.

The next night, Marie found Louise in her bed again, and this time she moved her head lower and lower, until she was blowing her sweet breath on Marie.  Marie, trapped in this sensation for which she had no rational name, spread her legs slightly.  Louise parted Marie’s nether lips and with her tongue, lapped and tickled, sucked and swirled until Marie started to scream.  A hand shot up from between Marie’s thighs and clamped over her mouth.  This was no impediment to the new sensation, for the joy she felt unleashed deep in her body, soared out her throat and into that hand. Kissing it, crying with sweet relief, Marie fell asleep and in the morning Louise was back in her own bed.

After that, Louise brought another game to their night time hours. Pain. At first she would bite a little of Marie’s lips, and then when Marie jumped, she would apply her lips and tongue to the part of Marie that flew her to heaven.  Each night, Louise would increase the pain just a little, and Marie looked forward to the pain because in her mind it became mixed with the extreme pleasure Louise imparted.  More and more pain, and then the resulting pleasure. Marie’s lips became bloody and tender, but that a small sacrifice for the ecstasy she felt.  Their play touched Louise too, for her pale and sallow skin had more bloom, obviously due to the great devotion she had for Marie.

One night Marie and Louise were playing their love game.  Marie’s pleasure was so intense she had to stuff a pillow over her mouth when she was thrown into ecstasy.   Louise now was sitting on her thighs, with Marie’s parts pulled up to her mouth, sucking and biting and lapping and swallowing the juices that poured from Marie.  It quite overcame Marie, and she went limp with spent passion.

That morning a carriage appeared at the door. Louise Duchamp was downstairs tying her bonnet. She was smiling at herself in the large glass in the hall. She looked radiant, her red hair curled and bright, her complexion glowing, her green eyes gleaming with secrets. A restored beauty and Mme Fournard quite amazed with the young woman she was watching at the bottom of the stairs. She hadn’t thought Mlle Duchamp would recover, much less to such an extent!

“Oh, Madame, you should check on Mlle d’Epinay.  I thought her a bit restless during the night, but when I looked, she was fine.  Perhaps a nightmare?”

Mme Fournard agreed and climbed the stairs.  Soon a loud scream erupted from upstairs, followed by a piteous moan. At the same instant, Mlle Duchamp blew a kiss at her reflection, walked out the front door and was helped into the carriage.

Marie d’Epinay was dead, pale as a ghost in her bed, and Louise Duchamp was never again seen in the Vercors region of France.

 

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2017   “Mlle. Duchamps” is included in the short story section of the new edition of  “A Seasoning of Lust”, Amazon.com, 2016

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‘The River’, from “A Seasoning of Lust”

September 15, 2017

 

revised-cover-2776

THE RIVER

 

The sun streamed in the window,

Like a jarring benediction

From a loud-mouthed priest.

It fell upon us

As we spooned asleep,

Your back turned to me,

My nose on your skin

Breathing in the miracle of you.

 

Last night, our first in spent passion,

That particular coin flowed like a river

Between us.

You brought hot, wet towels

To clean up the waters left by the flood.

 

Bending over me,

Parting my thighs with your hands,

I wanted you to leave the damp alone,

And slide

Into the faintly pulsing dark chasm,

My hollow twisting at the end of you.

 

But instead,

I curled up like a fiddle-head fern,

And embraced your dark head with my hands,

Pulling your mouth to my own,

 

And we flowed down that river again.

 

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2016  (“The River” is published in “A Seasoning of Lust”, Amazon.com 2016)

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“The Shibari Series”, Part 5

August 10, 2017
Kohut-Bartels-BOP-8

“Sea Eagle”, jane kohut-bartels, watercolor, 2001

 

SHIBARI #5

 

For the next week I remained in the mews. During that time I was prodded, examined and weighed. The Falconer was experienced and knew to avoid my feet when I was restrained. I would slice him, even with bindings securing my wings and the hood blinding me.

I was to eat only from his glove. He cooed, watching me as I greedily swallowed down the sparse meal, his dominance enforced.

When I was a woman I yearned for the ropes. I wanted them tightly around my body, ‘tender is the bight’ so to speak, yet now I pecked, pulled at my leather restraints. One day the Falconer found me hanging upsides down, like a bat, hooded and unhappy, but I gleefully bit him as he righted me on my perch.

Soon after, he put me to the glove and launched me into the air, I screaming in delight.

If I thought I had freedom I was fooled. The Falconer had tethered me with a long hemp rope. He jerked hard and I thumped back to earth.

“Good Girl” I heard through my outrage and humiliation.

“Good Girl” I heard as he pinned me to the ground.

–

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2017 (This entire series is contained in “A Seasoning of Lust”, by the author, Amazon.com, 2016

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The Shibari Series, part one.

July 29, 2017

 

My beautiful picture

My beautiful picture

This posting is a  bit different from what is usually posted here.  “The Shibari Series” was written when I was researching bdsm for a book, “A Kapitany”.  (“A Kapitany” will be published late next year)  I republished this series in “A Seasoning of Lust”, December, 2016 at Amazon.com.  

This series is about transformation, through different species of bugs, birds and finally into human form.  I haven’t posted this series before on this blog, but I decided it wasn’t that weird.

Lady Nyo

 

Japanese hemp coiled about the torso, creating diamonds where there was once only skin, looping back upon itself, over and over. Breasts now defined by a rope cut-out bra, while waist, love handles, now enclosed in more diamonds, thighs entwined.  Added turns and thin jute split my cleft with a hard caress, the large knot on the bottom shifting upward. It would tease in mid air.

Dance comes from the earth, through the feet, up and out, giving shape to song. This time I would dance in flight, the pull of ropes challenging gravity, compounding my efforts.

Movements liquid and extreme startled me, the kikkou and hemp anchored me in space, my first taste of freedom in the ropes.  Suddenly I felt the sting of a whip and I jerked out of time to the beat. I fell deeper into the dance, determined to continue.  Again the whip’s sting and I faced a split reality: pain or pleasure. I went inward, deep into the music and rhythm, where movement was birthed and pain banished.

I flew, hollow bird bones filled with joy.  Cradled within the ropes I spiraled up from heavy earth.

–

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2016

The entire Shibari Series is within the new edition of “A Seasoning of Lust”, Amazon.com, 2016

 

 

 

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‘Bad Karma’, from “A Seasoning of Lust”.

March 12, 2017

revised-cover-2776

https://goo.gl/YNzows

For my friends who have  a sense of humor…

–

Bao Ling sat on the balcony of Floating Wind brothel. A courtesan of low rank, she was deep into writing verse. She now had a scroll of 100 poems, needing revision.

“Bao! Bao! Squat Mother says you are to prepare for honored guest. Come in and apply your cosmetics”

Poor lame Midori was her maid and Bao turned her face obediently to the brushes and powders of her only friend.

“Who’s coming?” she asked as Midori painted her eyebrows high on her forehead.

“So sorry, but it’s Tanaka-san today.”

Bao’s eyes widened. “Aiiieee! He likes things pushed in odd places!”

“Just do as he wants. We’ll have rice balls later.”

Tanaka-san’s karma was to be short shafted and have peculiar desires.   Bao mourned her own karma.

In her confusion Midori grabbed the slim scroll of poems and put it where the sun don’t shine.

Midori was beaten. Over rice balls, they decided the poems had bad karma and probably belonged where they ended.

 

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted 2016…

 

 

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“O, Absalom!” Open Link Night at dverse…..

March 8, 2017

revised-cover-2776

https://goo.gl/YNzows

Gayle (Bodhirose)is leaving dversepoets to attend to her gorgeous granddaughters.  She will be missed by everyone.  Gayle has been a new friend, but one of the kindest poets (and wittiest) I have met.  Gayle, please be in contact when you can, you will be sorely missed by me and others. (and you know who!)

Jane

 

This second edition of “A Seasoning of Lust” was just published on Amazon.com in mid December, 2016. I want to thank, again, Nick Nicholson in Australia, for the work he did on this new edition.  The cover, the formatting, and his beautiful photographs in this edition make the book beautiful.  Amazon as publisher did wonderful work for this book.

Lady Nyo

—

O Absalom,

Ensnared by long hair in the

Boughs of an oak,

Pierced through the heart three times–

The shimmer of life fading.

 

I,

Pulled into mysteries

So abandoned by love

Now given over to lust

Charged with stolen rapture

Dizzy as a drunken dervish-

One hand upward to Heaven

One hand spilling to Earth

Skirts stiffened with sins hard as stone

Corrupted over a life time and now–

Flayed on an unending mandala.

 

Mystery of Life,

Unstoppable desire,

O beautiful Absalom,

We float upon a divine river

Entangled in the reeds of human wanting.

 

This is our nature,

This our calling while

Flesh answers flesh.

What quarter be given when the heart is

Overwhelmed by passion’s excess?

 

Lie still–

Let the waters cleanse our loins,

Mud of the banks soothe our wounds,

Our blood mingle with the floating grasses,

Our hearts sink beneath the surface.

Let the rivers of Babylon

Carry us away.

—

 

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2016

 

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  • Blogroll

    • "A Seasoning of Lust" Second Edition! Now on Amazon
    • "A Seasoning of Lust", erotica, poems and short stories
    • "Pitcher Of Moon", published 2014, Amazon.com
    • "Song of the Nightingale", published 2015 Amazon.com NEW BOOK!!
    • "The Zar Tales" published by Lulu.com 2010
    • "White Cranes of Heaven", ID# 10243736, listed as "White Cranes" at LULU.COM
    • Audra Simmons and Dark Side Studio
    • Kenneth Rexroth, poet and translator
    • Painting Website
    • Voice of Dance
    • William Gaius


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