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i like my body when it is with your body. It is so quite new a thing. Muscles better and nerves more. i like your body. i like what it does, i like its hows. i like to feel the spine of your body and its bones, and the trembling — firm-smoothness and which i will e. e. cummings* |
The sequence in which the following sexual behaviors are presented does not mean that such a progression is best in a particular sexual relationship or encounter; for example, a heterosexual couple may desire oral-genital stimulation after coitus rather than before. Nor is any one of these activities necessary in a given relationship or encounter: Complete sexual experience can consist of any or all of them, with or without orgasm. A sex therapist explained: "Once you’ve begun to think of sex as creating mutual erotic pleasure rather than as manufacturing orgasms, sex is a continuum of possibilities. You may find, for example, that low-key genital—or even non-genital—stimulation can be surprisingly erotic and relaxing" (Ellison, 2000, p. 317). In addition, because sexuality is influenced by the relationship as a whole, it may be best to think of foreplay as how partners have treated each other since their last sexual experience together (Joannides, 1996).
*"i like my body when it is with your. . ." Copyright 1923, 1925, 1951, 1953 © 1991 by the Trustees for the E. E. Cummings Trust. Copyright © 1976 by George James Firmage, from Complete Poems: 1904-1962 by E. E. Cummings, edited by George J. Firmage. Used by permission of Liveright Publishing Corporation.