Literary Sexts: A Collection of Short & Sexy Love Poems

by Amanda Oaks, Caitlyn Siehl (Editor)

Literary Sexts is a modern day anthology of short love poems with subtle erotic undertones edited by Amanda Oaks & Caitlyn Siehl. Hovering around 50 contributors & 124 poems, this book reads is like one long & very intense conversation between two lovers. It's absolutely breathtaking. These are poems that you would text to your lover. Poems that you would slip into a back pocket, suitcase, wallet or purse on the sly. Poems that you would write on slips of paper & stick under your crush's windshield wiper. Poems that you would write on a Post-it note & leave on the bathroom mirror. Treat yourself, a crush or a lover with this lush gift!

Genres: Poetry, Romance, Fiction, Love

42 pages, Paperback

First published January 24, 2014

About the author

Amanda Oaks is the founding editor of Words Dance Publishing, an independent press, literary blog + biweekly online poetry journal. Her works have appeared in numerous online & print publications, including decomP, Stirring, Glamour, Elle, Parenting, & Artful Blogging. She is the author of 3 poetry collections: Hurricane Mouth (NightBallet Press, 2014), her co-authored split book, I Eat Crow (Words Dance, 2014) & Where'd You Put the Keys Girl. Mama of two boys & a multi-passionate artist, she lives in rural western Pennsylvania, where she attempts to adult but is pretty lame at it. She digs poems that bloody her mouth just to kiss it clean. Connect with her @ http://amandaoaks.com

Reviews

[Sherna]

"I will destroy you in the most beautiful way possible. And when I leave you will finally understand, why storms are named after people.”

That is the line my friend sent me that made me want to read this anthology

[Alivia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading Literary Sexts is reading the first poem and thinking to yourself how cute and sweet it is. Then you read five, ten poems more and begin to really get into it and right when you're thinking "this book was such a good idea" you read one particular poem that hits you square in the chest and you just kind of sit back in your chair with a soft "oh". But you don't stay there for long because your eyes are hungry for more and boy does this collection deliver.

Long story short I loved it and am so ready for the next volume (2015 is too far away)

This collection of poems had me grinning from ear to ear and I didn't even realize I was smiling until my cheeks began to hurt. 4/5 stars and 10/10 would recommend

[Pauline · Rating 3 out of 5]

The collection as a whole feels a little cliché, a little superficial to me, when it could have sounded more honest, rawer. Many analogies lack surprise, lack truth. I was waiting for something more intimate, something that resembles the very unique and individual feeling that is desire, instead of a poetry that seems, at times, to be written merely to be "pretty."

However, some fragments stand out and hit you right in the chest. Those make the entire book worth reading; and in any case, the idea is exquisite : both modern and young, cheeky and inspiring, it's definitely something to work on and develop.

[Leyli · Rating 3 out of 5]

The one that really stood out to me was by Yena Sharma Purmasir. Despite being somewhat repetitive, it is a lovely collection.

[Mugren Ohaly · Rating 1 out of 5]

These so-called poems are nothing but poor attempts at romance and creativity from people that need to get laid. This is beyond disgusting and profane. There's nothing literary about it!

[Arya · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some poems really good, some kinda meh. My favourite ones were written by Nishat Ahmed.

[Jen Sombrotto · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's hard for me to give poetry anything but a five star rating, because it's so subjective and is interpreted in so many different ways depending on how you are and how you think. For me personally, I really liked this short collection of literary sexts, I just felt like some of them were a bit too similar to others and they were a bit too overdramatized to me. I thought the layout of the book itself was really cute, how the poems appear in text message type bubbles. Also, I love the cover of this book. My favorite poets in this particular collection were definitely Nishat Ahmed, Anita Ofokansi (whose poem I found on tumblr and actually influenced me to buy this book), Amanda Oaks and Dave Malone. I think I actually might have enjoyed the short descriptions about and from each author at the end of the book even more then the literary sexts. Most of them had a really clever description about themselves and what they do and it was just really cute. I had no idea that so many of these authors were in their early twenties and some even younger. I found that really cool. I recommend this book to anyone that loves poetry with that modern technology (sext) twist to the format of the book.
PS: This book is extremely short. You could read it in ten minutes. :)

[Roma Tournier-blake]

Contains the quote
‘Do not fall in love with people like me.
I will take you to museums, and parks, and monuments, and kiss you in every beautiful place, so that you can never go back to them without tasting me like blood in your mouth.
I will destroy you in the most beautiful way possible. And when I leave you will finally understand, why storms are named after people.’

[Wasil Ahmad · Rating 3 out of 5]

I go this book because of one line but didn't find it in the book, maybe I was misled about the quote.
It was "And when I leave you will finally understand, why storms are named after people." Apart from that it's an average collection of poems at best.

[Agnes · Rating 1 out of 5]

I did not like this at all (and I'm a sucker for good love quotes), looks like i have no heart. And the two quotes that made me buy this book weren't even in it?

[Izzie · Rating 1 out of 5]

Um...I really don't know what to say about these "poems". o.O

[Marika · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Daydreaming of running my fingers down your spine as if you were my favorite book. I want torn pages and I want smudged words." Darcy Vines, pg 22

Sexy love poems might be overstating things a bit, but this short read is still worth it.

The Pros (at least according to me):
- These are dirty, sweet, honest, awkward, lovely, profane - just like humans in general. I've sticky-tabbed the living hell out of the book, and it's under 50 pages, so that's pretty impressive.
- Despite their length, many of these are really hard-hitting gut-punches of longing.

The Cons:
- It IS only 42 pages. For $6.99 US, that can seem like a poor deal. I thought it was worth it. Volume 2 is 76 pages for $7.24 as of this writing so that's a plus.
- It is only available in paperback. I prefer to read on my Kindle, so that was a bit annoying.
- There is no preview on Amazon to see if this is your kind of thing or not. Volume 2 does have a preview, so check that one out if you're not sure about the kind of content.

[kelsie · Rating 3 out of 5]

7/10 Stars

I don't just want to take your breath away. I want to rip it from your mouth and keep it locked away between my teeth. You can only have it back if you kiss me again.

I came across a few of these poems on Tumblr and fell absolutely in love with the concept of Literary Sexts--no surprise coming from the woman who handwrites love letters and love poems. I think erotic poetry is often the best because it takes a subject that we don't often talk about and gives it the most beautiful voice. Not only that, but Oaks delivers a collection that is poetic but not unreachable for those of us who aren't as inclined to interpret poetry. The problem is, despite loving the concept, the execution was not what I had hoped. There were a handful of really lovely poems that I adored, but quite a few of the others weren't my cup of tea (and there were some themes that were so repetitive that I got deja vu).

[Ollie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some of these poems are beautiful others are not my taste, but none of them benefit from the format of the book. This book is formatted like a conversation of texts. Which is a great idea, but though each is beautifully written the poems read as if they weren't written to go together.

Sidenote: I bought this for the poem "Do Not Fall in Love With People Like Me" by Caitlyn Siehl which is quoted as being in this book in multiple locations online, but that poem is from her book What we Buried.
It's a beautiful poem that can be found here: https://www.google.com/amp/s/wordsfor...
Also note that the quote "I will destroy you in the most beautiful way possible. And when I leave you will finally understand, why storms are named after people." is not in this poem and is by a different author (I've seen MK Wilde referenced several times but I haven't been able to 100% verify this).

[Rawan Gamal · Rating 3 out of 5]

The short and light nature of the poems left me able to read more of them which is actually a good thing. Still, well, I wouldn't say i appreciate this in a "literary criticism" point of view. I liked it as a reader who just enjoyed reading about someone's genuine feelings in text messages form.
Am i crazy about it? no. But am i going to read the other volumes? yes, i guess i will.

[Evie Eva · Rating 4 out of 5]

A simple book of very short snippets of poerty and prose. Like with any collection some pieces really hit home while others didn't fit me. Still the over all reading experience was enjoyable. Seeing how others feel love, the words they use the parts they focus on, it's enlightening even if it's not how I see love.

[Ashley Cunningham · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have to say, I’m not a fan. The “poems” feel under developed. Some poems are okay, and then others feel like they shouldn’t be considered as poetry. I don’t know, but I wouldn’t recommend this short poetry book and I don’t want it in my personal collection.

[Vivien · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

[Dian Maerista · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ugh

[Rae · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't love every poem from this collection, but the ones I do I turn back to every now and again just for that spark of passion and inspiration.

[Delphine · Rating 1 out of 5]

28 pages of cringing « poems »

[Courtney Wade · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some of the poems were smuttier than I was expecting 😂 but I enjoyed the nuances of love depicted in the pages <3

[Alice · Rating 2 out of 5]

These are for the most part-one line poems, and while some of them were intriguing it felt like as a whole it was mostly mediocre.

[Xuan Kusek · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hot.

[Joshua Gage · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a short collection of "poems" written as text messages. The idea is clever, and certainly could work. However, too many of the poems became repetitious, which made the overall collection weak. I look forward to the second volume, and hope there's a wider variety of poems, vehicles and authors.

[Aseel]

somebody should show me how much love they got for me and buy me this book















http://www.amandaoaks.com/p/poems.html

[Micki · Rating 5 out of 5]

Money well spent on this little book. The title says it all. A delightful collection assembled by Amanda Oaks, clever, amusing and never too obscene for anyone's palette. A great book to leave on your coffee table, it never fails to start a conversation or at least make your curious guest blush.

[elle · Rating 2 out of 5]

A brilliant collection of short love poems, some more striking than others. A solid 3.5, I'd say. Rounding down for now although I really did love some of the poems a lot, there were still a few I felt were stiff enough to go down rather than up. Would still rec and reread, probably.