SEVEN ODES TO THE SEXY BEAST
1. ODE TO PSYCHE
In her best orator’s voice, Olivia recited, "So let me be thy choir, and make thee moan - Upon the midnight hours; Thy voice, thy legs, thy boobs, thy incense sweet…"
"Okay, okay," the blonde interrupted impatiently, unwilling to acknowledge just how affected she was by her partner’s poetry reading, and what a big sap Alex Cabot really was. "Enough already. Keats is spinning in his grave as we speak, I’m sure."
"- From Swingèd censer streaming. Thy shrine, thy grove, thy oracle, thy heat - of pale-mouth’d goddess screaming," the brunette continued.
Suddenly, Alex was blushing for an entirely different reason. "All right, Cupid," she tried again.
"Venus."
"Huh?"
"Venus, not Cupid," Olivia gave her wife one of her signature cheesy grins.
"Why Venus?" The question flew out of her mouth. Like always, she knew she would regret asking.
Her voice full of certainty and reason, the brunette explained, "I think Venus was jealous not because of her son’s relationship with Psyche, but because she wanted Psyche for herself."
"Huh." Alex paused, temporarily distracted by the possible explanation behind the speculation.
"Yes, I will be thy priestess…" Olivia grinned and continued.
2. ODE ON A GRECIAN URN
"… And, happy melodist, unwearied, For ever piping songs for ever new; More happy love!" Olivia exclaimed dramatically. "More happy, happy love!"
"What are you doing?" Alex just had to ask.
"Reading poetry to you, like Cass used to."
Oh, right, the blonde remembered, not that she could really forget. The brunette wouldn’t let her. "What’s with the Keats?"
"Jenny used to love Keats."
"Jenny also used to… Wait!" Suddenly, Alex realized just which Keats poem her partner was reciting. "You’d better not be implying that I shape like a Grecian urn!"
"No, no, no!" Olivia raised her hands in defense, shrinking from the blue daggers. "Why would I do that? You look wonderful."
The blonde glanced down at herself and let out a big sigh. "Because I’m fat."
"No, you’re not! You’re a size 4!"
"I used to be a size 2."
"Before two babies." Olivia offered helpfully, "I love you a little voluptuous."
"I knew it, you think I’m a fat Grecian urn," Alex sulked.
"Did I say voluptuous? I only meant sensual." Seeing no improvement in the situation, she tried another route. "You’re soft in all the right places. Like your boobs, I LOVE that they’re now a handful, and not just a kissful, or a mouthful… And your hips…" Very wisely, she stopped and decided not to continue along that line. "Look, at least you’re not Bullwinkle anymore."
"You used to love Bullwinkle."
"But I love you as you are now, and I’ll love you when we’re both crones."
Alex finally lifted a corner of her lips. "Promise?"
"Promise." Olivia wrapped her arms around the blonde, and smiled when she snuggled in. "More happy, happy love! For ever warm and still to be enjoy’d, For ever panting, and for ever young…" She resumed reading in a whispered voice.
"I don’t look like an urn."
"No," the brunette brushed aside the soft blonde tresses and nuzzled her wife’s neck. "But sometimes you do leave me with a parching tongue."
3. ODE ON MELANCHOLY
"She dwells with Beauty – Beauty that must… must…" Olivia chewed on her lower lip.
"Die." Alex provided.
"But it’s about you." The brunette protested, "And I’m trying to change the words."
"I’m getting a little tired of Keats, Liv. Can’t you think of other poetic mush to drown me with?"
"You know, Alex? You were a lot easier to please when you were seventeen."
"Sixteen."
"Going on seventeen."
"Fine, whatever. You didn’t try to get creative with Keats then."
"You didn’t require as much melodrama then."
"Excuse me? You’re calling me a drama queen? There should be a theatre on Broadway with your name on it."
Olivia met the storming blue eyes, and smirked.
"What?" Alex squirmed.
"I knew it. You haven’t changed a bit."
"What do you mean?" The blonde bluffed.
Putting down her notepad and her pen, the brunette advanced on her wife. "You’re drowning all right, and I’m here to be your flood relief."
4. ODE TO A NIGHTINGALE
"Already with thee! Tender is the night," the brunette murmured against her wife’s breasts. "And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne…"
Alex sighed. "Olivia, please."
"What’s wrong, Sweetheart?"
"The odes are sweet. They were sweet when you were Cass, and they’re sweet now…"
"But you really don’t like them anymore?" Olivia asked, trying to hide the hurt in her voice.
"It’s not that." The blonde sighed again. "I love it. You know I do. I think somewhere deep down, I’m still having issues with the fact that you were Cass."
"Why? Does it really bother you so much that I’m the only one who got under your shirt?"
"No. It’s not that, not that at all." Alex reassured with a small smile that quickly faded. "I just don’t know how I didn’t recognize you before."
"I didn’t recognize you either. It had been almost 20 years, and we were in so much denial. I thought we talked about it…" The brunette tried to help, but found herself at a loss for words.
"We did talk… but…"
"You are as beautiful and delicate as a nightingale’s song," Olivia whispered softly. "When you speak, your words are like diamonds falling through an azure sky. And when you smile, my heart takes flight with winged joy. Away! Away! On a blazing chariot of love, I will fly to thee!"
The blonde smiled despite herself. "You’re such a sap."
5. TO AUTUMN
"To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees," Olivia began, after Alex pushed her away for the fourth time. "And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core…"
The blonde pulled a pillow over her head, and sighed. "Please, Liv, stop. You’re not playing fair. I’m exhausted."
Ignoring her wife’s half-hearted plea, the brunette continued, "To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells - with a sweet kernel, to set budding more…"
"I mean it," Alex claimed. Her body, however, said otherwise.
"And still more, later flowers for the bees," she continued, then leaving Keats behind, "And yummy nectar for a busy little bee like me."
Under the pillow, a groan turned into a moan.
6. ODE ON INDOLENCE
"Ripe was the drowsy hour; the blissful cloud of summer-indolence." The blonde grabbed the book of poetry from the night stand and began to read. "Benumb’d my eyes; my pulse grew less and less; pain had no sting, and pleasure’s wreath no flower."
Meanwhile, the brunette just gazed at her wife, with a tender dreamy smile on her face.
"O, why did ye not melt, and leave my sense unhaunted quite of all but-nothingness?" Alex stopped and complained. "It’s not fair."
"What’s not fair, Sweetheart?" Olivia responded innocently. "I think you read beautifully."
"Yes, but me reading poetry to you doesn’t make you warm and gooey."
"That’s true." The brunette quickly appended her admission, "But that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy or appreciate it. I love your voice."
"You’re missing my point."
"No, I’m not." Olivia grinned. Then drawing from the fathomless depths of her love and devotion, she commenced reciting a verse of her own creation, "It’s not just the melodic dulcet tone of your voice, but everything about you, that sets my body ablaze with desire. Your very presence excites my wildest fantasies."
Encouraged by her wife’s bewitching smile, the brunette continued, "To drink from your lips the sweetest nectar, of one brief momentary taste of heaven - I will count myself both saved and blessed, my soul redeemed, for all eternity."
And once again, Alex found herself in a puddle.
7. ODE TO JOY
"Joyful, joyful, we adore Thee, God of glory, Lord of love;" Olivia decided to try to new experiment. "Hearts unfold like flowers before Thee, opening to the sun above."
"Oh, so we’re butchering Schiller now?" Alex drew her brows together and groused.
"Henry van Dyke," the brunette corrected. "Melt the clouds of…"
Interrupting briskly, the blonde asked, "Would you please stop?"
"Why, Sweetheart. I thought you were bored with Keats."
"Yes, but I was also hoping you’d quit the poetry reading. Just for a while. Please? Liv?" She begged.
The brunette tested another theory. Then, she brought her fingers to her lips. "You’re wet."
"Just hush." Alex slammed her eyes closed and sucked in a ragged breath when her partner’s fingers returned.
"If it’s not Keats, then what?"
"Your voice." She gasped her answer.
"I could be reading a phone book?"
"Probably…"
"Oh joy, oh rapture," Olivia announced with glee and gusto, accenting each word with a piercing stroke.
"Oh god…"