Too hot to handle: Tennessee bans poetry reading as "gateway sexual activity."



"Groin Central Station"?
Such cunning punning, sir!

No, they're not that far--yet--but the new law does ban any condoning mention of "gateway sexual activity" in the state's abstinence-only sex education classes.  As Governor Haslam actually said, "Kissing and hugging are the last stop before reaching Groin Central Station, so it's important to ban all the things that lead to the things that lead to sex." http://tinyurl.com/7uxeh8q This in a state that has just given the green light to teach creationism and deny global warming in classrooms.   http://tinyurl.com/828krvq   Some things are just too hot to handle.

If we didn't have so many serious problems that required so much serious thinking, this coyness in joining the 21st century might be charming instead of a deadly waste.  Thus, in honor of a great gateway sexual activity, and with great apologies to Andrew Marvell:

Had we but world enough, and time,

Two hundred to adore
each breast,
But thirty thousand
to the rest.
An age at least to every
part,
And the last age should
show your heart.

This coyness, Tennessee were no crime.
We would sit and refuse to think all day
And pretend that there is to us but One Way.
Thou by the Grand Ole Opry's side
Shouldst rubies find: I by the tide of the Mississippi
Would complain.  I would
Be learning ten years before the Flood,
And you should, if you please, refuse
Till all empty are your pews.
My vegetable love should grow
Vaster than empires, and more slow,
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine east hills and thy barbecue braise;

Two hundred to adore each breast,

But thirty thousand to the rest.

An age at least to every part,

And the last age should show your heart.

For Tennessee, you deserve this state,

Nor would I love at a lower rate.

Acid rain?  Global warming?
We'll think about that
tomorrow!

But at my back, I always hear,
Time's winged chariot drawing near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.
Thy beauty shall no more be found,
Nor in thy marble vault shall sound

My echoing song: then worms shall try

That long preserved virginity,

And your quaint honour turns to dust,

And into ashes all my lust;

The grave is a fine and private place,

But none I think do there embrace.