As elsewhere in his work, Lawrence offers a phallic eroticism in his poetry which, on the one hand, affirms and naturalises heterosexual intercourse as the great clue to being, whilst, on the other hand, challenging conventional thinking on sex and gender.
For as always with Lawrence, it's complicated ... There's a perverse spirit (or queerness) in his text that frequently deconstructs its own authority. He advises us to trust the tale, not the teller - fully aware of the narrator's proneness to unreliability - but often even this is risky as the tale (or verse) is never as straight - or straight-forward - as we might anticipate.
But what we can say for sure, however, is that Lawrence is fascinated with erect penises (including his own) and the thought of them deeply penetrating expectant bodies (including his own), to instill newness therein and ejaculate their masculine gleam.
But what we can say for sure, however, is that Lawrence is fascinated with erect penises (including his own) and the thought of them deeply penetrating expectant bodies (including his own), to instill newness therein and ejaculate their masculine gleam.
Obviously, as an author, it was vital for Lawrence to put pen to paper. But it's the phallus - not the pen - that is the bridge to the future and writing is ultimately a poor substitute for coition. As Mellors tells Connie in a letter: "If I could sleep with my arms round you, the ink could stay in the bottle."
But, as indicated, Lawrence doesn't just dream of fucking the girl next door; in the poem 'Come Spring, Come Sorrow', for example, he fantasises about being fucked by a solar phallus and inseminated by a fiery surplus of life, as if he were an open flower.
Failing that, the young Lawrence seemed happy enough admiring his own hard-on and trying to resist the urge to masturbate ... 'Virgin Youth' is an amusing poem born of adolescent sexual excitement mixed with anxiety: "He stands, and I tremble before him."
As one critic notes, the stirring of the silent but sultry and vast [!] phallus provokes "contradictory and unreconciled attitudes". The erect member is both a wonder to behold - a column of fire by night - deserving of quasi-religious veneration and a cause for embarrassment; an independent creature which, willy nilly, rises up and provokes all kinds of desires and frustrations.
Notes
D. H. Lawrence, 'Come Spring, Come Sorrow' and 'Virgin Youth', in The Poems, ed. Christopher Pollnitz, (Cambridge University Press, 2013). Note that there are two versions of 'Virgin Youth'. For many readers, the earlier, shorter, less comical version is the more successful.
D. H. Lawrence, 'Come Spring, Come Sorrow' and 'Virgin Youth', in The Poems, ed. Christopher Pollnitz, (Cambridge University Press, 2013). Note that there are two versions of 'Virgin Youth'. For many readers, the earlier, shorter, less comical version is the more successful.
D. H. Lawrence, Lady Chatterley's Lover, ed. Michael Squires, (Cambridge University Press, 1983), Ch. 19.
R. P. Draper, 'The Poetry of D. H. Lawrence', in D. H. Lawrence: New Studies, ed. Christopher Heywood, (Macmillan Press, 1987), p. 16.
This post is for Nottingham based writer James Walker.
