Leading up to my keynote panel at Catalyst Con East – where I will be talking about sparking conversations in sexuality – I’m going to try to start some sex conversations here on the blog and on Twitter. To learn more about this project, check out the original post.
Check out the rest of the days here on the blog or use the hashtag #SexQOTD on Twitter.
Sex Question of the Day: What Pieces of Literature Have Gotten You Off?
I vividly remember the moment I read The Color Purple and it talked about playing with nipples and “pushing the button” and how hot your body got when it happened. I’d been masturbating for years without calling it that, but for the first time ever, I didn’t feel alone or ashamed of this act.
Listen, she say, right down there in your pussy is a little button that gits real hot when you do you know what with somebody. It git hotter and hotter and then it melt. That the good part. But other parts good too, she say. Lot of sucking go on, here and there, she say. Lot of finger and tongue work…She say, Here, take this mirror and go look at yourself down there…I lie on my back and haul up my dress. Yank down my bloomers. Stick the looking glass between my legs. Ugh. All that hair. Then my pussy lips be black. Then inside look like a wet rose…
I say, Where the button? Right up near the top, she say. The part that stick out a little. I look at her and touch it with my finger. A little shiver go through me. Nothing much. But just enough to tell me that this right button to mash. Maybe. She say, While you looking, look at your titties too. I haul up my dress and look at my titties. Think bout my babies sucking them. Remember the little shiver I felt then too. Sometimes a big shiver….But when I hear them together all I can do is pull the quilt over my head and finger my little button and titties and cry.
Like most people, I didn’t have comprehensive sexual education growing up, so I had no idea what I was doing to my body or why I did it. I just knew, I got into trouble when I got caught doing it in public. Picking up The Color Purple in sixth grade, I had no idea it would change my life in such a profound way. It was the first time I had permission to claim my sexual self and is still an inspiration for me as a writer, to maybe one day reach young girls, like myself, who felt alone in their quest for sexual pleasure.
Let’s talk! Leave your answer to this QOTD here or tweet it to me @QueerieBradshaw.
I love this question. I had never really thought about this before. While I was in college I was introduced to erotica. I have to say that the book Erotique Noire/Black Erotica turned me out! It is an anthology of black erotica. The story that took me over the top was The Hog Caller’s Party by MJ Morgan. It taught me the “power” of words.
Do you have a link for the book by chance? I’d love to read it!
I love to read erotica (especially secretly in public on my kindle…shh don’t tell). Almost anything Sinclair Sexsmith has written has probably gotten me off a time or two.