In the beginning, Adam and Eve defied God’s instructions and ate from the tree of good and evil. When God returned to the Garden and called their names, they covered themselves with fig leaves to hide their nakedness, which really was the embodiment of their shame. Ever since, the fashion of the children of men has progressed from “coats of skins” to the haute couture of designers such as Calvin Klein, Liz Claiborne, Oscar de la Renta, Donna Karan, Tommy Hilfilger, Ralph Lauren, Armani, Gucci, Versace, Dolce, and Gabbana, to name some of the well-known.

In this technologically-savvy generation in which millions of people can connect, hook up, and communicate in just a click, we have shed our inhibitions as passionately as clothes during breathy, hot moments, pre-coitis. And even though we feel we have moved off the therapists couch, this generation has embraced sexy, made-to-wear fashion, because of how it makes us feel – on the surface, like a film star or international model; and under the skin, good fashion gives us confidence, liberation, and a sexiness we fully intend on cashing in on.

The themes behind many of these thoughts came to life while reading Reb Livingston & Ravi Shankar’s delightful chapbook “Wanton Textiles,” which is a series of clever, poetic communications between possible lovers or simply long-time Internet friends. Below the surface, however, I dare say “Wanton Textiles” is a convincing paradigm of current-day relationships – love in the days of long-distance commuting and Internet romances, where passion is exhibited via sexual innuendos transmitted real time through broadband connections and Windows-enabled PDAs. It seems the new foreplay of our generation.

The opening line of the work (Reb’s first letter), for example, is evidence of their long distance relationship: “Ravi, [I’m] driving through the Mojave this evening” (p. 7). Throughout the book, Reb will make her way to Ravi, so we think, via Vegas, Lake Tahoe, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Bombay; and along the way, find herself in limbo at a train station, champagne bar, a dangerous neighborhood, and in smelly, damp hotel rooms.

This depiction of the long-distance relationship has another aspect for the main character, Reb. She feels she is taking an epic journey. For what? I could not rightly ascertain. Maybe it is to understand love. Maybe it is to realize how separation changes one’s outlook on real love. Needless to say, Reb’s character seems thrown out into an unkind, wilderness and she must find her way back to her Garden without any distinct map or directions: “I’m surrendering every shred to a tarot reader,” Reb writes early in the work. “[S]he says follow the graves and I shall.”

Throughout “Wanton Textiles,” Reb and Ravi tease each other perfectly, creating sexual tension by describing clothes, textiles, and fashion accessories. Consider this line as an example: “Entropy sticky between/girl and boy, itching fabric clinging/teasing like tassels” (Page 23).

They also turn clothes, textiles, and accessories into evidence of sex or longing. Sprinkled in the poetics are picturesque images of camisoles and pants, saffron threads, slacks whose zipper is missing teeth, buttons, pinching stilettos, soiled socks, undershirts, lace, and bras and boxers. They even use them to dress up sexual symbols, such as holes in the ground that are covered by dark tarps.

Sadly, though, the sudden bursts of teasing and gradual build up of sexual tension and passion is never resolved – our lovers never meet; there is no evident consummation. The resolution seems all cerebral.

This fact causes one to pause to reflect on the somber moments throughout the work in which their love and/or passion is celebrated or questioned. These are delicious moments of depth and they create classic conflicts. Consider this excerpt from page 12:

I also wish to highlight Ravi’s poem on page 18 in which he celebrates their love by suggesting their passion is “our great religion”:

Our great religion, like Lawrence’s,
is a belief in the blood, not wind
and quibbles flung out like corn to fowl,
not the fine art of back lighting a head,
but giving head backed into a tight spot

....

Because the body wants its transport nasty
before it fails, falls into a slough that crooks
the spine, punctuates the veins in relief
upon the calf like a string of ratty Christmas
lights no hose can hide, no leg lifts efface,
but let’s try, stretch, recover, uncover, unstitch,
redo, wallpaper with wet tongue, unrepentant
as Mohammed, arms akimbo, surfaces surfed,
caverns craved, a flare of awareness shot
into the sky hotly before ebbing to reflected
sunlight in the atmosphere...

Lastly, I wish to point out a phrase from Reb’s letters that seems to transform her character to the point that she transcends the writing on the page and becomes real-life and tangible. The first phrase appears in a letter in which she reveals she is in a dangerous neighborhood, where good and evil exists in equal quantity and strength -- “[p]laces where people go to be stabbed – places that can be named – named as warnings.” We sense her distress, the fear of her life and the weight of its possible end. Upon this stage, Reb suddenly adds the poignant phrase: “see I’m real and weep” (p. 24).

Reb also reaches a transcendence with this plea after contemplating the shame and sorrow of soured relationships: “Salvation through obliviousness? Please Jesus” (15).

“Wanton Textiles” is indeed a satisfying romp through the psychological and primordial landscape of modern love, accentuated by separation that continuously fuels passionate longing. But even more than this, most importantly, “Wanton Textiles” is a highly enjoyable work read after read. Every page entertains, pleases, and impresses! It is a joy!

~~~~~

Reb Livingston, also an editor and publisher, is author of Your Ten Favorite Words (Coconut Books, forthcoming) and two chapbooks, Pterodactyls Soar Again (Whole Coconut Chapbook Series, 2006) and Wanton Textiles (No Tell Books, 2006) (collaboration with Ravi Shankar). Her poem “That’s Not Butter” appears in The Best American Poetry 2006 (Scribner).

Ravi Shankar, poet‑in‑residence and assistant professor of English at Central Connecticut State University, is the author of Instrumentality, a collection of his poems, published by Cherry Grove Collections in Cincinnati, Ohio. Shankar’s poetry has appeared in The Paris Review, Poets & Writers, Time Out New York, The Massachusetts Review, Gulf Coast, Lit, The Indiana Review, Crowd, Descant, and the AWP's Writer's Chronicle. His poetry has been awarded the Gulf Coast Poetry Prize and the Bennett Prize for Poetry at Columbia University. His critical work has appeared in Poets & Writers, Time Out New York, The Iowa Review, and The AWP Writer’s Chronicle.