"Sex Without Love" by Sharon Olds

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses in detail the poem, "Sex Without Love" by Sharon Olds: The mere choreography of sex raises the deepest questions about body, soul, God, love and aloneness. The author believes that although some have interpreted this poem as an argument against casual sex, particularly the kind of casual sex that leads to mothers giving away their unwanted babies, the poem is actually a philosophical meditation on aloneness.

From the Paper:

""How do they do it, the ones who make love/without love"? The use of "the ones" seems to separate them out into a separate race, almost non-human, perhaps uniquely gifted. The first line ends on the word "love?" ironically, because she is talking about the lack of love. The next line emphasizes that irony, beginning with "without love." By repeating love, and because of the lovely rhythm of "love without love" we are already taken right into the heart of this contradictory poem, which brings us passion, God, love, sweat, ecstasy?and yet all the while talking about sex and the body, shorn of any other meaning."

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