A Brief History of Nakedness by Flower Conroy

A Brief History of Nakedness

by Flower Conroy

(published in Duende, Issue 2, 2015)

In the beginning was clay 

made flesh & tingle, & a tree 

akimbo.  Rosy kernel buds 

& dripping limbs, a glimpse

of petal.  A winged breeze,

breath changed into angel,

rustled the greenest green 

grass, the bride’s muff, 

& the groom’s tuft of chest hair.  

This was nakedness’ first gesture: 

not the legs, the knees 

& elbows of the descending nudes—

but that incarnation betwixt  

branches, halo-less, butterfly 

turned back into a worm.

The rest is core & stone, leaf, sin

I mean skin & bone.

Oh, the sounds in this poem! Clay and made; tingle and tree; akimbo, limbs, and glimpse! And that's just the start--the slant/soft/true rhyme keeps coming.

But the second stanza goes beyong this playful diction, and fulfills what started with the first line, an obvious nod to the Garden of Eden. "The first gesture" of nakedness which is described by the poet so sensually and with such unexpected detail: "butterfly/turned back into a worm." Not even a caterpillar, but a worm--both more phallic and more snake-like.

The last two lines give us true rhyme, drawing more attention to the words Conroy wants us to really notice: stone, bone, skin, sin, and the soft assonance of leaf and mean.

This poem pulls the reader in with a fun title and has fun until the end.