La petite mort

‘Draw a picture of an orgasm.’ ~ Girl On The Net, What an Orgasm looks like: A weird and pretty cool competition

Who does she think I am, bloody Picasso? I thought to myself. I have many creative talents but I can tell you now that drawing is not one of them, however when I read on I discovered that

“you can use any visual media as a means of showing what an orgasm looks like (so photos/graphics/crayon on the back of an envelope are all fine)” ~

A photograph you say, a picture of an orgasm you say….

Yep, I have one of those.

I posted this picture back in 2012 along-side a piece of flash fiction about the build up to oral sex. It just seemed to fit the words perfectly back then as the piece ended with the words “And then the ecstasy.”

This image has always felt like looking at my orgasm. When going through my picture library looking for something I nearly always captured my eye and I will end up opening it full screen and sitting here for a moment, absorbing the feelings this image elicits in me. Of all the images I have ever posted of myself, this one feels one of the most exposing and yet it is one of the least graphic but for me it captures a feeling, for me this is what an orgasm looks/feels like.

Those soft blurred lines, my form almost disappearing into the world around me, the light, the sheets, the very air consuming me. Everything is brighter, smoother, softer and yet there is an urgency and rawness. There is a strange contrasting mix of tension and release, there is movement and stillness all at the same time. There is more of me and there is a less of me. I am vulnerable, open, and very much IN my body.

I have always been drawn to the French phrase ‘ la petite mort’, the little death, as a term for THAT moment when you body is seizing up around you, when your nerve endings jangling until finally releasing you over the edge into that moment of unexplainable pleasure where you are briefly nothing and everything all at once.

So what does an orgasm look like for you? If you have an answer to that question then head over to Girl on the Net and share it with her, there are prizes, but to be honest I am more interested to see what people do/make of this idea as I think it is a very personal and challenging thing to represent visually.