I love to be in eros with you she says

by Duc Dau

16 February 2026

winged Eros melts our limbs says Sappho

the erotic a well of replenishment says Lorde

that fountain filling, running says John of the Cross

Emily’s hands Sue’s fingers are found inside says Dickinson

the poem an aspiration to an inspiration says Hopkins

and prayer God’s breath returning us to our birth says Herbert

our love Eve’s breath in Mary’s mouth I say

Notes

  1. Sappho, Fragment 130 (translation by Anne Carson in If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho)
  2. Audre Lorde, “Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power”
  3. John of the Cross, “Song of the Soul that Delights in Knowing God by Faith” (translation by Seamus Heaney in “Station Island”)
  4. Emily Dickinson, letter to Sue Gilbert Dickinson (“Sweet Sue, There is no first, or last, in Forever”)
  5. Gerard Manley Hopkins, The Sermons and Devotional Writings of Gerard Manley Hopkins
  6. George Herbert, “Prayer (1)”
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about the author

Duc Dau is a bisexual/queer Vietnamese-Australian writer living in Boorloo (Perth) and based in the School of Humanities at The University of Western Australia. She is the 2025 winner of the Annette Cameron Award for an emerging poet in Western Australia. Her academic books include Sex, Celibacy, and Deviance: The Victorians and the Song of Songs (2024).

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