Urges impel me.
Eager, apprehensive,
how shall I reach
the object of my desire?
Can you be real?

I hesitate.
I might mess up,
be mistaken, be wrong
or—most devastating
—feel foolish.

Longing leads me.
Compelling energy
surges and carries me
inexorably forward
along a path.

Unable to perceive
my destination.
I project, at best,
a blurred image
—a half-imagined fantasy.

It becomes my obsession.
I tune that vision,
refining expectations
even before I breathe
its fear and promises.

Finally I release all
to emergent reality.
Soul and body,
thrust into wonder,
grasp each other desperately.

I could not know
where to follow my desire.
I dared not predict
a destination
nor even the journey.

Only by going there
could I obtain
the curse and the blessing.
Sex and the sacred,
so dearly the same.