Erotic. That was the first word that came to mind when I read Levertov's "The Poem Unwritten". I connected to her intense sexual desire for this other person she wanted so badly. It didn't matter much to me that she was a female talking about a male - the passion is the same I have felt before. Each word of the poem is delicious. I can feel every sensation she wants me to feel on the body of her lover. The most magnificent thing about the poem, though, is the reverence with which she treats the act of making love to her husband. To Levertov, sex is a holy act. “stroking, sweeping, in the rite of/worship,” she writes, describing how she will touch him. For her it is so much more than a sport or a pastime. It’s more than just a selfish, pleasure-seeking game. It’s about love and the other person - a detail too often forgotten in our modern world. Levertov waits for marriage to consummate their love, refusing to let her desires taint her morals. While she calls the years that pass “a forest of giant stones, of fossil stumps” she knows someday her beautiful poem of love will be written. The imagery of the poem reminds me of the still of a young Claire Danes waiting for her Romeo is Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet. All of those feelings are there in her face: desire, impatience, reverence, and just enough restraint to make it through to the night.