Day Sex Ode
Toward dusk the light was lapis, veined with cirrus, bird, and contrail, poplars alchemizing green to gold, a light we might call glassy with the sun behind it, low and cutting, like the final word of an ongoing argument. We’d fucked so hard the bed had bounced us off. We’d laughed, in shame or shock, then climbed back in. Night had not come on yet, as it would— the bikes were paper cut-outs in the distance, their riders one-dimensional, unhurried, pulling the dark behind them. Originally published by Plume, appears in The Unbecoming (Norton, 2026)
Audio: Kathy Fagan reads “Day Sex Ode”
Kathy Fagan is the author of seven poetry collections including Bad Hobby, winner of the 2023 William Carlos Williams Award. A recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, and an Ingram Merrill Foundation Fellowship, Fagan is professor emerita of English at The Ohio State University.
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"veined with cirrus, bird, and contrail" had such lovely sounds that I had to reread the poem several times!
"We’d fucked so hard the bed had bounced us off." Iambic pentameter never sounded so good! :)